


And They Will Write Our Myths in Gold

by alittlebitsuper, DangersUntoldHardshipsUnnumbered, thebraveandthebroiled



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Historical Divergence, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Tattoos, F/F, Polyamory, War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-06
Updated: 2017-12-12
Packaged: 2018-11-09 21:27:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 23
Words: 55,194
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11113200
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alittlebitsuper/pseuds/alittlebitsuper, https://archiveofourown.org/users/DangersUntoldHardshipsUnnumbered/pseuds/DangersUntoldHardshipsUnnumbered, https://archiveofourown.org/users/thebraveandthebroiled/pseuds/thebraveandthebroiled
Summary: Based on the universe first introduced in "Prayers to the Rising Sun."In an alternate universe, Egypt's monotheistic religion of sun worship, Atenism, never died out, and is now a major religion.  National City is its "capital" in America.  It is a tech hub, a capital of science and rationality, a paragon of social and intellectual openness.  It boasts a thriving Alien District and takes pride in being a sanctuary city.  It is to this National City that Kara, wondering what to do with her life, moves to, to be with her sister Alex, a recently retired spy who now owns a tattoo parlor, and her aunt, who has recently resurfaced after Kara had long presumed her dead.The DEO under the direction of Lucy Lane, is spoiling for a fight with Cadmus, and Lucy's wife, Lena Luthor, struggles to distance herself from her controversial mother, Lillian, its cold, calculating mastermind.  It is against the backdrop of this war that Lucy and Lena find themselves taken with National City's newest alien resident, Kara Danvers, and each seeking their own identity and version of justice in the world, they find themselves drawn together.Through love, and through war, they will all be irrevocably changed.





	1. PROLOGUE

They had taken the war outside of the city. 

It was good.  There were too many lives in the city, packed too closely together.  And so many structures built to the glory of the Aten that would be vulnerable to destruction.

The enemy army had entrenched itself in the base of a canyon in the desert.  But the DEO force under the command of Director Lane was strong, and they came with a legion under the command of another general, the one called Astra.  

Lucy Lane was a child of the Aten, a soldier of its light, and her war was righteous.  At least, it had started that way.  She thrived on the light of the sun, and fought to see justice done.  It was good.  She served at the pleasure of the leader that they called Marsdin, and Marsdin was not a human, and not a child of the Aten, but still wished to see justice done.  She wished to see Cadmus routed from the places where they hid, at the bottoms of canyons, and down on the floor of the sea.  

The legion under Astra would not serve under Lucy Lane, but in common cause they agreed to fight beside her forces.  Astra was the child of a sun god, too, a faraway one that they called Rao, and Astra was born on a world that belonged to that god, called Krypton.  That world died, but the Aten took pity upon her and those like her when they came to this earth, and bestowed on her remarkable gifts; the gifts of flight, of superior hearing and vision, eyes that brought forth a concentrated fire, breath that spread winter anywhere she willed it.  Her niece was also thus gifted, and they were equipped to fight and win.

Beside Astra stood her lover, her compatriot, a human called Alexandra, armed with many weapons and eyes lit with the fierceness needed to fight.

And so down into the canyon the forces of the DEO advanced, dropping from the air, descending on lines down its walls.  And many among Astra’s legion were similarly gifted as she was, and they spilt over the sides of the canyon and descended unhurt to its floor.  But many were human, as Alexandra was, and they required equipment to make the descent.  

But Alexandra was carried in her lover’s arms, held tightly to her side.  

And a rumbling rocked the ground and the face of the canyon opened, and behind it many armored vehicles, their weapons raised and lamps blazing. 

“I think,” Alexandra called into the radio that connected her to Lucy, “this surprise op is not a surprise!”

Lucy laughed fiercely then, and called out an order, and from an enormous set of speakers mounted on top of a pair of flatbed trucks, music blared.  The trumpets of war.  Only instead, it was roaring guitars. “Highway to Hell”, they called it.

Humans and their rock and roll.

“THEN LET’S GIVE ‘EM HELL!” she cried.  And her heart thrilled to see the best of her men descending onto the field of battle.

“COPY THAT!” Alex cried in response, and the battle began in earnest.

Astra’s legion descended, and those with gifts moved to the fore, to face the armored vehicles first instead of the softer and more breakable humans.  Astra’s niece, Kara, also gifted, descended through the air and landed beside them, with Lucy in her arms.  Kara was Lucy’s lover, and she would stand between her and whatever meant her harm.  Lucy Lane was a breakable human, but she was a child of the Aten, and she was the leader of her forces.  She would not be seen shrinking away from battle.  

The joy of entering into combat beside one’s lover has always created a particular and deep bond, a unique wellspring of shared passion unlike any other, throughout history, across many races.  Even the children of Rao had legends of it.  Lucy’s heart was filled with it every time she entered the fray with Kara beside her.  Even Alexandra, who had not so long ago sworn that she would never take up the sword again, could not help feeling the thrill of fighting beside Astra.

The Kryptonians advanced first, tearing the armored vehicles to pieces with their hands.  Alex’s heart stirred at the sight of Astra lifting the vehicle and rending it in two as though it were paper, hurling its wreck against the canyon wall, and then emerging unscathed from the resulting explosion.

Alex Danvers was the first to regard the platoons of Cadmus’ men moving forward through the clouds of dust and sheets of fire.  She was alarmed to note the glowing green canisters in their firearms.  They were Kryptonite-loaded firearms.  Shattered fragments of their dead world were like poison to those gifted Kryptonians.  The DEO had expected this might be a problem. The game was going to change, now.  They had prepared for it, but nevertheless.  Astra was now vulnerable, and Alex did not care for that situation.

Lucy was wise enough to know that she would be a target.  Perhaps,  _ the _ target, worth more even than Kara or Astra.  She was more than the leader of this operation;  she was the righteous fire that burned beneath the DEO’s holy war on Cadmus.  If she were to fall…

She pushed in front of Kara.  She could see the platoons moving forward.  She called out to Alexandra to bring in those of Astra’s forces who not vulnerable to Kryptonite.  The ordering of their legions rearranged.  Alexandra called out to the smallest of Astra’s warriors to set off the a pulse to disable all of those weapons which relied upon electricity, as discussed.

Astra’s legion all wore shields and armor like that of her favorite warrior, James, who was also known to some as Guardian.  They deployed their shields, and as the smallest of the Astra’s legion set the charge, they formed a shield wall, locking themselves together, with Guardian at the point.  Lucy called out formations to her forces to flank the shield wall on either side.

The roaring music of war ceased.  The energy weapons of Cadmus and the DEO alike hummed softly and then died in their hands.

Energy weapons disabled, the enemy had no choice but to resort to firearms that relied upon gunpowder, and whatever else they had at their disposal.  This would not be the clean battlefield of energy weapons and pathogens released into the air.  It would be a brutal one, and it would run with blood.

Humans, and their thirst for blood.

The DEO forces flanked Astra’s shield wall and Lucy, clad in Kevlar and carrying the DEO’s banner, an automatic firearm slung across her back, went out ahead of the point of the shield wall to lead the fight.  

But Cadmus army was circumspect, and did not show their full force at once.  The DEO and Astra’s legion awaited a charge that did not come immediately.  Alexandra’s belly was uneasy with doubt and Astra shared her concern.  It was a poor idea for Lucy to be out ahead of the shield wall when she could easily (and more safely) call tactics from behind it.

It was Alexandra who saw the soldier running towards them.  She cried out to Lucy to take cover but no human ear could hear her over the din of battle.  

Those in the shield wall closed ranks.  But it was too late for Lucy.  Alex saw the soldier strapped with dynamite and headed toward Lucy and the shield wall.  She, with her flawless marksman’s eye, fired several rounds into his explosive pack, stopping him before he reached his destination, the close ranks of Astra’s legion.  The soldier’s body exploded in flash of white and a sound like a giant thunderclap contained in a space too small for it.  It did so prematurely, while there was still some distance between him and the legion, and so, those behind the shield wall did not fall.  

But Lucy?  Ah, Lucy.

She lay on the ground, considering, as she stared up into the night sky, that perhaps she had gone wrong with the plan for this assault after all.  She could feel nothing, which usually meant that everything was injured, and far worse than anything she’d gotten in Afghanistan.  She could half-hear Kara’s voice shouting her name.   

She felt herself being lifted into Kara’s arms and carried up into the night.  She wondered where Kara was taking her.

_ Kara, I have to stay with my men. _

The stars glided by her eyes.  She was dimly aware of Kara’s breathing, Kara’s errant tears.

_ Kara, honestly, I’m fine.  You don’t need to worry. _

_ I’m fine. _

She would not have pictured events unfolding thusly just six months ago...


	2. Six Months Prior

Lucy woke up before sunrise, as was her way.  Her body had gotten used to this routine from the time she was a child and her mother would wake her to welcome the day and give thanks to the Aten for its golden rays.  It wasn’t her father’s way, but she had found other means to win his approval.  She had become a soldier, just like him.  

She sat up in the bed, and gazed for a long, quiet moment at Lena’s sleeping face.  The world saw Lena Luthor as this carved-from-marble, flawless beauty, and she was.  But she was not so immaculate behind closed doors, and Lucy preferred her that way.  She adored her long, dark hair in a disheveled cloud around her face and how soft she looked without that pomegranate-red lipstick she favored.  

Lucy liked the lipstick, too, of course.  She liked immaculate, stylish, public Lena.  But she loved messy, sleepy, low-contrast, private Lena even more.  She had, in fact, convinced herself that the discretion that they shared with regard to their relationship somehow made it that much more special.  Not only was Lucy the only one who got to see Lena Luthor all flawed and soft, but few people, apart from a handful of their respective inner circles, even knew that she and she alone held that privilege.

From beneath her veil of sleep, Lena murmured, “What are you looking at, Director Lane?”

Lucy gave her a fond smile.  “Nothing, Madam Chairman.”  Lena was the chair of the National City Science Council, in addition to being the CEO of L Corp.  She’d gotten all of the Luthor genius, and none of the Luthor madness, and Lucy loved every ounce of the force Lena’s intellect was capable of.  Her lover’s family name aroused suspicion from more than a few, but Lucy knew her soul.  She was a child of the same god, adherent of the faith, worshipper of light and one who sought to purvey rationality and justice.  On reflection, they were an obvious match.  “Only the sun my world revolves around.”

Lena snorted then, and opened her eyes.  She flopped playfully on top of Lucy and pinned her down.  “Oh, knock it off.”  And she kissed her warmly.

Lucy chuckled against her lips. “Come on, it’s only a  _ little _ sacrilege.”

Lena glanced at the sky, the pale of the morning preparing to come through the windows as the city’s hard stars faded and burnt themselves away.   “Yeah, yeah,” she grumbled, but she wasn’t in a surly enough mood to carry it off.  

It was getting to be the good season for having sunrise prayers on the roof deck.  It was the true onset of spring in National City, and the mornings were still cool, but warm enough that she and Lena didn’t so much mind being naked for the few minutes it took to do their devotions and receive the sun’s first rays on their skin.  In about six weeks more, the nights would be warm enough that they could sleep in the pavilion on the roof deck.  Lucy looked forward to that.  It was a special treat to make love in the outdoors and fresh air and then be able to rise and pray and be blessed.

They knelt naked before the altar, as they did each morning in the warm weather, and sang the hymns.  It always made Lucy feel comforted, beginning each day with the rituals of this, the oldest of the world’s surviving faiths.  To worship a sun god was to worship a god that was tangible, measurable, rational, brilliant.  

Lucy stood then, and leaned forward on the beautifully designed glass altar that Lena had commissioned from some famous glass sculptor.  The sun’s splendor glistened all over its surface and trickled down the veins of gold threaded through the rays of the great glass sun atop it.  After the hymns, Lucy often liked to take a moment for herself, to feel the Aten’s light, and to pray silently, privately, for signs of the Aten’s love that day.

She prayed for many things in those quiet moments.  She prayed for Lena’s protection.  She prayed for the strength and cunning to defeat Cadmus.  She prayed for her father, that the Aten’s rays would find their way into his heart.  She prayed for the men and women who served under her, that their minds would remain sharp and their weapons ready.  She prayed for the city, and all those in it.  Sometimes, she prayed for friend and former lover, James, that he would finally find purpose in his life.  Anyone who didn’t know Lucy Lane would never understand how much love she had in her heart for the world.

 A small shape caught her eye, streaking above the buildings downtown.  “What’s that?” she muttered. 

Lena rose up off her knees and came to stand beside her.  “What’s what?”

Lucy pointed at where the sun’s golden glow was edging up over the lower-slung buildings of downtown, near the alien district.  “I don’t know.  I saw something…”  She was peering into the light now, which made it difficult to be sure of what she had seen.

Lena watched too, and for a moment, they were staring out over the city.  

She saw it again, and this time, it drew closer.  It had veered away from the downtown area, and was now soaring up the waterline, in their general direction.   It was so small, but as it drew nearer, Lucy could see, yet could not quite believe her eyes.  “It’s a person,” she whispered.

“No,” Lena whispered back. It was impossible.

But they watched.  It clearly was a person, and he or she was brazenly defying the laws of physics and arcing across the empty air.

Then the person, whoever they were, descended below the buildings, and to their disappointment, they didn’t see the mysterious form again.

“Can you explain that?” Lucy asked, her eyes wide, looking in vain for another glimpse of the figure.  There was only one alien in town who could do that, and Lucy was pretty sure that wasn't them.

“I actually can’t,” Lena murmured back.  “I’ll just keep my eye on the news today.  Maybe you should check in with the NCPD, too.  You know.  Just … in case.”

“In case what?” Lucy tensed, glancing over at her wife. 

“I don’t know.” Lena turned to gaze at the horizon.

Lucy nodded.  Then:  “Maybe don’t go downtown today if you can help it.”

Lena rolled her eyes.  “I can handle myself, Luce.”

“Just be careful, that’s all.”

 

 

*******

 

 

Breakfast, when Lena was left to her own devices, was usually something healthy that involved egg whites and probably kale.  Lucy wasn’t particularly fond of either of these things, but when your wife was cooking, and she looked like Lena Luthor, you’d eat packing material if she set it in front of you, and thank the Aten for it.  At least she would make coffee though.  Fair trade organic, harvested and roasted by rehabilitated ex-convicts retrained through a privately funded social justice program, no doubt, because Lena was that way about everything, and Lucy liked that.  

So they ate.

“So?”  Lena asked, pouring her a cup of steaming, savory-smelling Sumatra.  “Are they going to give you more boots?”

Lucy shook her head.  “I don’t know yet.  I’m trying to pressure my dad.  Cadmus is really getting to be like an infestation and we’re not going to be able to deal with this properly if we don’t have the manpower.  The Joint Chiefs might actually listen to him.  The problem is getting  _ him _ to listen to  _ me _ .”

Lena nodded thoughtfully, munching on a little of her egg white omelet.  “Does he think you’re wrong about the situation, or your assessment of what the situation needs?”

Lucy’s brow furrowed.  “I don’t know.  He just keeps deflecting.  Telling me the Pentagon’s budget is strapped, and it’s a ‘hard sell’–”  She punctuated this with violent air quotes.  “–getting them to prioritize a fight against an organization that targets non-humans.”

Lena wore a little moue of distaste at that.  “Has he even been down to the Alien District?  Does he know any aliens personally?  There are entire cultures that he’s just writing off when he says stuff like that and–”

Lucy waved a hand to stop her.  “Don’t act like I don’t know.  My father can call himself whatever he wants, but he’s a racist and a xenophobe, pure and simple.”

Lena nodded sympathetically.  “Your dad, my mom.”

Lucy sighed.  Sometimes she actually forgot that Lillian Luthor, Cadmus’s ruthless matron, was Lena’s mother.  Sometimes, she actually forgot that out of the many reasons for their choice to exercise discretion about their relationship, that Lillian was pretty close to the top of that list, if not Number One.  Lena certainly didn’t want her mother knowing she was bisexual, much less that she was romantically linked with the Director of the government organization specifically tasked with alien matters, and who had been a rather direct and specific thorn in Lillian’s side since taking the helm there.

“Well, there must be some agents you can reactivate in the meantime, no?  Maybe some early retirees you can get back into the field or something?”

Lucy sipped her coffee and gave Lena an affectionate look.  “Actually, that’s a good idea.”

Lena shrugged.  “Of course it is.  I’m fucking smart.”

Lucy laughed.  “Don’t push it.”  

But Lena had gotten her thinking.  She was sure that there were a few good agents that would be incredible assets if she could find a means to coax them out of retirement.  Two, in particular.  She’d have to take a trip downtown.  


	3. Starflower

Alex breathed in.  

She breathed out.

Her ribcage expanded, and then compressed, and she felt herself existing within her body, and within the world.  She breathed in the air, the green of the trees outside, the sunlight that would be creeping over the horizon soon.  Soon the chimes for sunrise devotional would be ringing out across the city.  She soaked in the predawn quiet of the space in her airy loft apartment, the smell of basil plants growing on the windowsill.  She had never shaken the military lifestyle of rising early, at least not yet.  But then, it had only been about six months since she left the DEO, the government black-ops group tasked with monitoring alien life on Earth.

It had been an eventful six months, though.  She’d taken her early-retirement bonus and opened a tattoo shop, as she’d long dreamt of doing.  The dharma practice she’d taken up before she left the DEO, the one that had led to her leaving it, had also led her to sobriety at around the same time as her departure.  The twelve step programs tended to aggressively push “God as you understand it”, and Alex wasn’t really there for that, but the meditation helped, and so did a lot of the philosophy of mindfulness and Buddhist notions about suffering.  She used to drink to numb herself.  Now she let herself exist in her body and sometimes feel uncomfortable things, with the knowledge that she wasn’t going to heal unless she did.  She was getting better at letting them pass through her, and realizing that she was still standing when it was done.  She didn’t take part so much in the rituals these days, as she had when she’d first joined the Dharma Punks, but she still meditated daily.

One of the other major events of the last six months stirred up above in the loft.  Alex had found herself someone to hold and kiss and mumble soft things to in the middle of the night.  And that someone was stirring in her sleep for what sounded like deeply unpleasant reasons.

She climbed the loft stairs and found Astra, tossing and turning, a few inches above the mattress.  The pitfalls of dating a powered individual, she supposed.  She approached cautiously, placed a hand on Astra’s heaving chest.  “Hey,” she whispered.  “Hey, Astra.”

Astra’s voice was low and choked, pleading for whomever she was talking to in her sleep to stop whatever it was they were doing.  Alex had a good enough idea of the who and the what.  Her pulse hammered in her throat as she leaned a little closer.  She felt Astra’s heart beating through her chest.  Alex placed another hand on her forehead and tried to wipe away some of the sweat. She had to be gentle and careful. If Astra woke too suddenly, Alex could get hurt.  

But Alex knew how to do this, how to rouse a Kryptonian from a nightmare without getting herself hurt.  She'd had lots of practice while she was growing up.  You had to get close enough to touch their face, their chest, but be positioned someplace you wouldn't likely get hit if they woke up flailing.

She climbed up onto the bed and stood on the mattress, straddling Astra’s restless, floating body.  She hunkered down and tried again, placing her hands as she had done before.  “Astra,” she said several times, trying not to raise her voice too suddenly.  She just kept repeating her name.  She increased the pressure of her hands the volume of her voice gradually, until Astra’s eyes flew open.  She trembled.  Her eyes found Alex and she grabbed her and drew her close on top of her, in an embrace that was just a little too hard, and they shot up a few more inches off the mattress.

Alex gasped a little but didn’t object.

“You having those dreams again, babe?”  she grunted.

Astra’s breath slowed after a moment of holding onto Alex.  She loosened her hold.  “Yes.”

“Wanna put us back on the bed?”

Astra glanced to the side and realized where they were.  “Yes.”  She sounded a little embarrassed.  They dropped back onto the mattress with a soft “thud”.

Alex kissed her forehead, stroked her hair.  “Let’s try this again.  Good morning, General.”

Astra gave her the same little smile she always did when Alex addressed her that way.  Astra wasn’t a general, not anymore, but she liked it when Alex used her old title as an endearment.  It told her that she valued the part of her that was a warrior.  “Good morning, my brave one.”  They kissed.  Astra’s hands spent a few moments tracing the lines of the Japanese inkwork that adorned Alex’s lean, muscled arms, then they settled at Alex’s waist, and her fingers fiddled with the elastic waistband of her pajama pants.  “What time is it?  Do we have time for…?”  She smirked.

Alex smirked too.  It had taken a bit of effort on her part to break Astra of referring to sex as “copulating” or any number of other painfully clinical terms for what was, at least to Alex, one of the sweetest parts of being human.  “Why, yes, we do.”

Truly, even if they didn’t, Alex would have made time.  Astra preferred to scrub off her nightmares with lovemaking.  Also, Astra liked to begin and end her days with it.  Also, she liked it after dinner, before showers, when she was happy about something, when she was sad about something, or if you played her the right kind of music.  Sex was a new thing for her, and she was making up for lost time.

Fortunately, so was Alex, having sorted out her feelings about women a bit late in life.  But even she, fit as she was (and she was very fit), sometimes had trouble keeping up.  Superpowers made Astra literally tireless, and that really wasn’t entirely fair.

Nevertheless, they shimmied out of their sleepwear and sank into each other’s bodies, warm, still sleepy, a little rough, wanting.  It was intense and deeply felt most times, as they worked out all their grief and anger and guilt on each other’s bodies.  Alex made love to Astra like she was trying to make her forget she'd ever felt pain.  

And good grief, Astra was loud, but Alex didn’t mind that a bit.  Astra’s endearment for her, specifically during sex, was “Starflower”.  It was the English translation of her dharma name, Myoge.  Astra liked the idea that she was addressing Alex by a special name that represented the true nature of her soul.  And it sounded awfully fine when Astra would moan it while Alex was kneeling between her legs, or as an affectionate sigh in her ear when Astra buried fingers inside her.  

They lay for a few moments after they were done, lightly sweating, and then Alex said, “You know, you’re going to have to figure out a way to keep it down a little when Kara gets here.”

Astra frowned.  “We cannot have sex while she is here.”

Alex shook her head.  “Well, she may be here a while, Astra.  She needs to find a job, find a place… that can take a little time.  We can’t just stop having sex entirely while she’s here.  I mean, what if she’s here a few months?”

Astra’s frowned deepened.  “No, that will not work,” she agreed.

Alex shook her head.  “She’s supposed to be coming in today, so, we should probably start thinking about it.”

Astra nodded, but said nothing.

 

 

*********

 

 

Kara moving to National City would be the other major event in Alex’s life.  Kara was her sister – foster sister, more accurately– and had grown up with Alex since the age of thirteen.  Kara’s cousin, Kal-El (or “Superman,” as he was known to the citizens of Earth), had dumped her on the Danvers family’s doorstep after she’d crashed on Earth in a tiny pod, traumatized and confused.  Their relationship was complicated by the fact that Alex had been burdened with more responsibility for Kara’s safety and care than was really fair for a girl her age, but as adults, they loved each other desperately.   And Alex was good at science, and Kara was good at science, so when they were getting along, they shared that.  Alex also liked art, and Kara liked art, and even when they weren’t getting along, they could share that.  Alex could take out the set of body paints, and they’d sit in silence, painting stars and flowers on each other’s hands and forearms, wordlessly mending whatever rift lay open between them.  

Alex also had a gift for languages, and she ended up learning a little Kryptonese in an attempt to make Kara feel at home.  Of course, fourteen year old Alex had wanted to know the dirty words in Kryptonese, but Kara only knew a few.  She had been too young to know any of the really good stuff yet.  And of course, some things got lost in translation.  But now Alex had a Kryptonian girlfriend, so she was learning those. 

Outside, Alex could hear the chimes that rang in the sunrise prayer for Atenists.  If she were out in the streets now, she’d see all the Atenists stop, repair themselves to the sunniest location available, bow their heads, and bare their shoulders to the sun to sing the morning hymn.  The whole thing only took five minutes at most, but it had taken some getting used to, living someplace where three times a day –sunrise, sunset, and when the sun was at its zenith– more than half the city just stopped what it was doing for a few minutes.

Over coffee, she asked, “Is it a Center day today?”  Astra taught Kryptonian martial arts two days a week at Antiope’s Combat Center in National City’s Koreatown.  In addition to a formidable obstacle course, Antiope had several studios in her combat training complex, and offered classes in over two dozen fighting styles, everything from kung fu and Krav Maga to wushu and fencing.

Astra shook her head.  “Firing range.”  Astra also worked a few days a week as the day manager at a firing range in the alien district.  Unlike regular guns in America, alien weapons were heavily regulated, so anyone who was interested in practicing with offworld weapons had to visit the range where Astra worked.  The station rental fee included the use of any number of energy-based alien weapons, from your garden variety ray guns to more interesting items like javelins with plasma-based explosives in the heads.  Those weapons were then returned upon ending one’s session, and stored in a highly secure manner. Each one was implanted with a chip that immediately alerted the U.S. Army if it was removed from the premises.  Alex generally agreed with the notion that alien weapons shouldn’t be floating around in the general population, but wasn’t so sure she loved the idea that, apart from the DEO, Astra’s job had the biggest cache of energy weapons in a hundred mile radius.

Astra looked at Alex for a moment.  “You seem troubled.”

“Well, Kara … I mean, I told her we’re together, but I… I left out a lot of things about how we got together.”

Astra nodded.  “It is better.  Those are things to discuss in person.”

Alex sighed.  “I know.  I just …”  She shook her head.  “Sometimes I wish that you and I had met some other way.”

Astra smiled sadly, set down her coffee, and came around behind Alex to slip arms around her waist.  Alex melted back against her inhuman warmth.  “Misery acquaints a man with strange bedfellows?” she suggested, and leaned down to kiss behind Alex’s ear.

Alex chuckled a little.  Astra was reading The Tempest now, or trying to, because Alex had mentioned that Kara was fond of the Bard.  “I don’t think that’s what Shakespeare had in mind when he wrote that.”  

She glanced out the window.  The sun was up.  They had time for a little shower sex before she had to go open the shop.


	4. Steel and Starlight

Kara had considered piling all of her belongings into the back of the ten year old Corolla she’d been driving around Evanston for the last six years, and driving all the way out to National City.  But as tolerable as her time at Northwestern had been, she was ready to shed that life entirely, and that included the charade of having to drive around in a car she didn’t really need.  She’d spent her entire final semester there spoiling to quit living this closeted life and while she didn’t entirely know what that would mean, she knew it didn’t mean driving all the way out to California with her life boxed up in the back of her Corolla.

So, she sent it all out to National City via UPS, to a storage space in a neighborhood she hadn’t even seen.  She sold her car.  And finally, liberated of all the baggage that came with pretending to be human, she let her feet leave the ground and soared out across the open sky toward California.

“You don’t need to pretend, here,” Alex had promised her.  “There’s lots of out loud and proud aliens.  There’s a whole neighborhood with alien-owned shops, alien bars, it’s great.”

The prospect was too tantalizing to pass up.  She didn’t really know what she was going to do after college, and she didn’t want to just hang around university for the rest of her life collecting PhDs and Masters degrees the way some people did.  She didn’t know what her calling was, but she knew it wasn’t that.

She’d done extensive reading on National City before she left.  It wasn’t just an alien neighborhood with an open culture.  It was a mecca of science and rationality, a culture of intellectual openness.  That was what college was supposed to be, but it hadn’t been, not really.  She had met a couple of Atenist kids while she was there, which was more than she’d encountered growing up in white, Christian Midvale.  They had been interesting, smart, well-educated and tended to be socially liberal on one hand, but intensely strict about ritual on the other.  She tried to extrapolate what a culture would be like where that was the majority persuasion.  If nothing else, it would be interesting.

And then there was Astra.  After many long years, she was going to finally see the aunt she thought she’d lost as a child.  She hadn’t been told much about why she’d disappeared.  Her mother had left a great deal of information about Krypton, about its culture and art and science, and about their own family, accessible through an AI installed in the pod that she’d arrived in.  But the AI was rather circumspect on the subject of Astra’s disappearance from their lives.  She knew that her mother had been forced to send her to prison for “acts of political dissidence”.  The AI would not elaborate on what those were.  Nor would it tell her whether she’d been incarcerated on Krypton or been sent to one of those offworld floating hellholes like Fort Rozz.

So when Alex told her that she’d encountered her in National City, Kara was first shocked, then confused, then excited.  Another living relative!  And Astra, no less!  She had a friendly but distant relationship with her cousin Kal-El, and that was fine.  He was busy being Superman.  And frankly, while she tried not to harbor bitterness about the fact that he’d simply made her some human family’s problem, she couldn’t help feeling a little abandoned.  But Astra had been special to her.  Her mother’s twin sister, and so different from her mother in many ways.  Kara had always been fascinated with her mother’s twin, with her exploits, wanting to hear war stories when she came back from a campaign.  Her aunt had always seemed overjoyed to see her again, and after a long stretch away, she would stay with her family for many days, lavishing so much affection on Kara.  It only occurred to her now, as an adult, that because Astra was a genetic aberration, an unplanned twin, she was not allowed to reproduce.  Kara was the closest thing she would ever have to a child of her own.

And seeing Astra would be the closest thing Kara would ever have to seeing her mother again.

It would be more like family than anything she had shared with Kal-El, at least since she held him as a newborn in her arms.

It bothered her that Alex was as vague as her mother’s AI when it came to the circumstances of her meeting Astra.  And she was still kind of digesting the fact that her sister and her aunt were a couple, now.  

But none of that mattered.  Now, she was soaring above the world, watching the topography of America slip by far below her, feeling the full measure of her speed and power for the first time since her semester abroad last fall.  She felt the wind on her face, felt it tugging at her hair.  She sliced through the clouds over the cornfields of Missouri, dropped low to get a look at the Cadillac Ranch along Route 66 near Amarillo, slowed down for a moment to take in the colors of sunrise on the Sangre de Cristo Mountains near Santa Fe and smile.

She could smell the water before she could see it, could feel the change in the air before she arrived at the coast.  She saw National City from a distance, the skyline sparkling with a mixture of modern skyscrapers and touches of Egyptian influences.  Even from far away, she could see the enormous glass pyramid that was the temple of Aten, just as it looked in the photos she’d seen, and the gleaming steel obelisks that stood by the water, marking entrance to the city from the sea.  She hooked south and approached the city from that direction, to get a look at it from all angles.  She wanted to see its ports, its downtown, its gay district, its business district, the Mexican architecture of the low-slung buildings of Old Town.  As she drew closer, she realized that many of the shiny surfaces of the buildings, especially the taller ones, were actually solar panels.  She wanted to just hover in its wings, breathe its scents, get a sense of it, before touching down in the Alien District and making her way to Alex and Astra’s apartment.  

Alex lived downtown, which was where the alien district was, along with most of the other things that interested Kara.  She landed by the obelisks at the piers on the West Side and worked her way inwards.  She passed Geelax’s Registered Firing Range.  A number of what looked like art galleries, though they were closed.  She stopped at a food truck that was selling some sort of meat-filled pies.  Its reptilian owner grinned at her with two sets of teeth.  “Good morning, pretty lady!” he growled cheerfully, spreading his plastic-gloved hands wide.  “You like Briv’vozi rice pie?”

She shrugged.  “I never had one.”

He chortled.  “No worry.  Mago fix you right up.  New on planet?”

She shook her head, smiling.  “No, just new in town.  I’ll take two of those pies, please.”

He spooned the concoctions from a steam table into separate cardboard travel dishes, then wrapped each one in foil.  “You don’t smell like human,” Mago observed as he handed her the two wrapped parcels.

“Didn’t say I was,” she answered with a grin, handing him a pair of fives.  She bit into the pie.  It was delicious.  The crust wasn’t so much a crust as a warm, moist, chewy wrapper not unlike a wonton, if perhaps a bit stretchier.  The filling was some sort of spiced meat.  She didn’t ask what sort.  She probably didn’t want to know.  She was hungry after flying across country and wanted to eat, now.

But, they were delicious, so she bought two more and munched on them as she strolled through the streets.  This part of town still had some  cobblestones, and the buildings were old and charming (although not as old as the ones in Pueblo Viejo, or Old Town, one of the few parts of the city that still held with the Spanish influenced architecture of the early California settlers).

She peered through the window of what appeared to be an enormous LGBT bookstore and community center, “Sappho’s Books, Eats and Treats.”  Eats and treats seemed a little redundant to her until she looked further back and saw a curtained-off section selling sex toys, safety gear, and stocking a number of pamphlets that appeared to give advice on not just gay and straight safe sex, but interspecies sexual health and safety as well.  She’d never seen anything like it.  Treats, indeed. 

Once or twice in her wanderings, she took note of a few aliens who seemed to be walking arm in arm with one another, as couples did, except there were three of them.  Add it to the list of things she’d not encountered in Midvale or, for that matter, in Evanston, or even her semester in Greece.

Boutiques stocked hip bohemian clothing.  She passed leather shops featuring cuts for humans and other species, and she wondered whether maybe it was time for a leather jacket.  Most places weren’t open now, and probably she shouldn’t spend the money until she had a proper job, but the thought attached itself, and didn’t quite let go.

She finished the last of her Briv’vozi rice pies as she drew nearer to the part of the neighborhood that was Alex and Astra’s.  Yes, she was nervous about being a burden, excited and apprehensive about seeing Astra again after so long, and not quite sure yet what she was doing with her life.  But as the sun was coming up and illuminating the city, she felt something else she hadn’t felt in awhile: hope.

 

 

*******

 

 

It hadn’t occurred to Kara that Astra would have learned to cook, but apparently she had, and she basked in her aunt’s enthusing at great length about humans and their food while she prepared two enormous omelets, a skillet full of home fries and a couple of strawberry smoothies.  The last time she’d seen Astra, which was a literal lifetime ago, she’d been dressed in Kryptonian military uniform.  Now she wore a jeans and a Foo Fighters tee shirt with the sleeves torn off.  She cooked.  She listened to the local rock station.  She read voraciously about Vikings, and Roman history.  She was different.

Kara tried to picture this new Astra with her sister, and she had to admit it was easier than picturing the one she had remembered.  

Alex had already left for work, but Astra had a few hours before she had to go to the range (her Friday job) and so they were able to spend some time together before she had to leave.  Their ebullient back and forth was occasionally punctuated by sudden embraces that were unconcerned with being gentle, because they understood instinctively that they wouldn’t be able to break each other with too much affection if they were trying to.  They were family, built the same, bulletproof, made of steel and starlight.  Astra still fussed over her and called her “Little One,” and they sometimes would stop in the middle of talking about life among the humans, and their eyes would well up as they realized they had found each other again.

“So,” Kara sighed as they were finishing their meal.  “Alex didn’t want to tell me a lot about how you two met.  She said that you were being held by the DEO and she got you out.  She didn’t want to get into a lot of detail.”  

Astra nodded.  “Yes, that is so.”

“How come you were being held?” Kara persisted.  “Was it an immigration issue or something?”  She dabbed at her mouth with her napkin.

Astra sighed.  “Little One, I made some terrible mistakes when I came here.  I did not want Earth to meet Krypton’s fate, and my efforts to prevent this were … I did not choose the best methods.”

Kara peered at her for a moment.  She wished she knew more about what Astra had done on Krypton that had gotten her incarcerated.  “So, you didn’t decide to be a Super, like Kal-El?”

Astra shook her head.  “I tried to… conquer and control.  The DEO resisted us.   I was caught and imprisoned.”   Her face paled, and Kara watched Astra draw in her on herself as she talked about it.  

“That’s how you met Alex?” Kara asked incredulously.

Astra nodded.  “She… she was… honorable.  She respected me and I respected her.  We had many long talks during my imprisonment.  And then, the Army came in and tortured me.  Alex prevented them from doing it again.  She cared for me afterwards.  And then she absconded with me, and made a deal for my freedom and safety.  I sold Non out to them in exchange for my own interests.”  She looked down at her hands.  “I am not proud of what I did.”

It was a lot to take in.  Kara digested it for a moment.  She had never liked Non.  She had always felt that he was not good enough for Astra.  Astra’s honor had always meant a lot to her, and Kara couldn't imagine what Astra went through in coming to the decision she had made.  She wanted to know more about the torture.  But then, maybe she didn’t.  She didn’t press.  If Astra wanted to share, fine, but Kara knew it would probably make her angry.  Instead she asked, “And when did you fall in love with her?”

Astra thought about this for a moment.  “It began even before  I was imprisoned, only I did not know it for what it was, then.  It was after we had left together, and she allowed me to stay with her… I was… broken, and lost.  She… helped me build myself up into something new.”

Kara understood now why Alex didn’t want to get into it on the phone.  It was a lot.  It was complicated.  She couldn’t help being concerned.  Astra was perhaps the strongest person she’d ever known and still, the whole thing felt like shades of Stockholm.

“I know what you are thinking,” Astra said softly.  “But the moment we left the DEO prison, I was free to go.  She is the reason I am alive.”  She gave Kara a pained smile.  “I have been discovering the way that humans love.  It is different than what our own people used to do, but I… I like it.  Alex makes me feel things... new, pleasant things.  We are kind to each other.  We are not the same, but we are alike in many respects.  Our broken places… fit each other well.”

Kara nodded and said nothing.  Alex was certainly broken in her own ways.  Kara had been living with the Danvers family when they lost Alex’s father, Jeremiah, out on a DEO field mission.  And Eliza’s passing a few years back, while Kara was in college, was the snuffing of a shrinking number of true lights in Alex’s world.  Their relationship, fraught as it was, had become more important in the last few years.  Kara and Alex would die for each other, though one always hoped it would never come to that.  But she saw it now in Astra’s face; Alex had found someone else who loved her like that, another relationship that was perhaps a bit complicated in some ways but was held together by an undercurrent of deep, strong love.  Alex had found someone else who would die for her, and that was no small thing.

Astra glanced at the clock over the stove.  “I must go to work,” she announced, breaking the somber mood that had settled.  “But I will drop you off at Alex’s shop on the way, if you wish.”


	5. The Man With the Shiny Tattoos

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Maggie does some police work and Lucy chases a hunch.

“Did you get a look at the assailant?” 

Maggie was asking this question for the umptillionth time.  

“Yeah,” the skinny goth girl answered, puffing her cigarette as the ambulance rolled away with the victim in tow,  “he looked human.”

Maggie tilted her head curiously.  “He  _ looked _ human?”

The girl nodded.  “Yeah. I mean, sometimes you can't tell, right? But he had these really wild tattoos.  Hard to miss.”

“Where?”

“His arms.”

“What’d they look like?”

“They were shiny.”

“Shiny?”

The girl blew a puff of smoke into the cool morning air.  “Did I stutter?  They were shiny.  Metallic.  Sort of a… a copper color.  But shiny.  They were pretty rad, to be honest.”

Maggie sighed.  This was the fifth in a spate of attacks on alien shop owners in the district in just the last two weeks.  Most of the time, the witness accounts were sketchy.  This was the most she’d gotten thus far.  She prodded the girl for a little more information.

“How tall?”

Shrug.  “Maybe six foot?”

“Build?”

“Like a linebacker.  Big shoulders.  Didn’t really see his face, though.”

Maggie nodded.  She was taking the girl’s information down in case she had any followup questions.  

“Planning on leaving me out of this one, Detective?”

Maggie glanced up from her notepad.  Approaching her crime scene from across the street was Director Lucy Lane of the Department of Extranormal Operations.  They had a pretty good working relationship as interagency relationships went, relatively free of the territorial pissing contests she often found herself caught in when she had to deal with the FBI and other G-men.

“Wouldn’t dream of it, Director,” Maggie answered politely.  She waved the goth girl off.  

Lucy Lane sauntered over, a slight smile on her lips.  “Just kidding.  Aten’s blessings, Detective.”

“Same to you.”

Lucy glanced around at the scene, the ambulance rolling away, the yellow police tape.  “What exactly happened, here?”

“The victim had to be rushed to the E.R., I figured I’d call you guys after I finished clearing the scene and questioning the witnesses, per usual.”

Lucy smiled.  She was a sharp-looking woman, Maggie thought.  The DEO blacks did right by her, though Maggie knew she was highly-decorated Army and wondered sometimes, idly, what she looked like all kitted up with her medals and whatnot.  Pretty good, she reckoned.  “No worries, Detective.  I just wanted to come downtown this morning so I figured I’d pop by here when I got word of a dust-up.”

Maggie nodded.  “I see.  Well, you could say there was, I guess.  Another shop got trashed.  Gordanan drycleaner’s shop.  Shopkeep was there at the time and took something big and breaky to the head.  Looks like they gassed the place first, since we found some tubing apparatus still dangling from one of the outside vents.  My money’s on fentanyl.”

Lane made a face.  “Why?”

Maggie shrugged. “I guess they didn't want any resistance and Gordanans are big and know how to fight.”  

Lucy shook her head.  “No I mean, why would your first guess be fentanyl?  That's not exactly standard street thug issue.”

“Yeah, I know.  It's hospital stuff..  But I had another guy get gassed last week and his labs came back with fentanyl. Apparently it works the same way on a lot of aliens as it does on us.”  

“Hm.  They take anything?”

Maggie shook her head.  “Register’s empty but it doesn't look like the shopkeeper cashed in yet.  One of my guys is looking through the tickets and there seems to be a black Burberry trench coat missing.  That's about it.”

“Thug had good taste,” Lucy remarked.

Maggie glanced over at the coffee cart on the corner and nodded over toward it.  “Cuppa joe?”

Lucy nodded.  “Don’t mind if I do.” 

They walked over and Maggie ordered herself a small, black coffee.  Lucy ordered one light and with two sugars.  They made small talk while they waited.

“Padres are having some season,” Lucy remarked.

“Be even better if Wamukota would come back from the DL.”

“Yeah, but you know how it works.  It’ll be worth the wait.  They always come back stronger after the Tommy Johns surgery.”

The cart owner passed Maggie her coffee.  A few beats of silence ensued.

“How’s the missus?” Lucy asked.  Maggie always felt like Lucy was inspecting her, dissecting her with those intelligent eyes, every time they spoke.  Maggie could sure hold her own, but she’d never cross Lucy Lane if she had a choice.

“Oh, well, she’s not the missus anymore, I guess I didn’t mention it before.”  She smiled wryly.  Veronica had passed herself off as a businesswoman but in reality had been a glorified bookie.  Maggie had known she was a bit emotionally stunted but she figured, how often would she get an opportunity to land a girl that rich and that hot?  So what if she was a fixer-upper?  It would be understating things to say it hadn’t ended well.  

Lucy seemed mildly surprised.  “For how long?”

Maggie’s phone buzzed in her pocket.  She pulled it out.  Another text from Veronica that she wasn’t going to read.  “Speak of the devil,” she muttered.  “Few months now.”

“Sorry to hear that.” Lucy seemed sincere when she said this.  She seemed like a decent person, Maggie thought.  But that was common to most of the Atenists she’d run into.  They were generally reasonable people. Even the top brass at the NCPD, which was entirely Atenist in composition, was fairly honest in its operations.

Maggie shrugged.  “We all get one big mistake, right?”

Lucy smiled knowingly.  “Maybe.  I guess I’ve been saving mine up.”  Lucy took her coffee, paid, and they walked back toward the yellow tape cordoning off that section of the block.  Maggie never did ask if Lucy had a missus or a mister.  She didn’t wear a ring.  But maybe she was one of those professional women who just liked to keep her marital status to herself.  If Maggie really cared to know, it’d be easy enough to find out. Right now though, there were more important things to discuss.

“So, I don’t like this spike,” Maggie said, sipping at her coffee in the cool morning.  The sudden uptick in attacks in the district had her worried.

Lucy nodded.  “Yeah, it does feel a little off… I don’t think it’s random, do you?”

Maggie shook her head.  “Yeah, not really.  I mean, it could be one or two jerks with a vendetta, or it could be something worse.”

Lucy chuckled. “My first instinct is usually to treat it as if it’s something worse and be pleasantly surprised if it’s not.”  

Maggie gave her a wry smile.  “You’re thinking Cadmus?”

Lucy shrugged.  “Maybe.”

Cadmus was a shady organization that seemed to have mutated several times in the course of its relatively short life.  At first it had existed as little more than a rumor, a shady research group mistakenly linked to various other government organizations:  CIA, NSA, DEO.  When President Marsdin tried to shut them down by cutting their funding a couple of years ago, their Head Bitch in Charge, Lillian Luthor, had simply excised the entire thing whole from the body of the government, and began funding it herself.  They were suspected of being a paramilitary group, but nobody could find any evidence of this.  Earlier in the year, they had been linked to a number of larger-scale anti-alien plots that the NCPD had managed to foil, with a little help from her daughter, Lena.  Lillian Luthor walked around with the veneer of respectability that billions in personal wealth affords one, despite being the mother of the infamous Lex Luthor, the genocidal maniac who was locked away in a SuperMax facility. She had more or less “adopted” a group of survivors of an alien attack, setting up a foundation to see to their needs, a gated community to make them feel safe again, and became a very public advocate for the rights of those endangered in that rather infamous “Myriad” incident.

Maggie was mildly skeptical.  “Beating up drycleaners seems a little small-time for Lillian Luthor.”

Lucy nodded.  “True.”  She glanced around.  “So, you’ll send us your labs and everything on this?”

Maggie lifted her coffee cup.  “Of course.”  She paused for a minute, and then asked, “So what’d you come downtown for?”

Lucy Lane glanced around then, seeming hesitant for a moment.  “I, uh… saw something this morning, over the sky downtown.  Wondered if you’d seen it.”

Maggie looked at her.  She seemed agitated.  “What’d you see?”

“Well, that’s just it.  I’m not sure.”  She glanced around again, sipped her coffee.  “You have any aliens down here that can fly?”

Maggie chuckled.  “You mean like Metropolis’s Man of Steel?”

“Exactly.”

Maggie shook her head.  “Not anybody I know about.”  She tilted her head and looked at Lucy.  “You think you saw someone flying around like Superman?”

Lucy put her hands up defensively.  “I don’t know what I saw.  I just wondered.”

Lucy Lane came all the way downtown because she “just wondered”?  It seemed unlikely.  She didn’t strike Maggie as the type to come out of her way on a hunch.  She’d seen something.  She was just being cagey.  

_ Well, whatever.  _  “Is it a personal or a professional curiosity?”

Lucy shrugged.  “Little of both.”

Maggie nodded, considering her.  Their conversations were often a little stilted, but not exactly unpleasant.  “If I hear anything, I’ll let you know.”

“Thanks.” Lucy took a few steps away, but turned back to Maggie. “Aten’s blessings on you.” 

“Same to you, Lucy.”

And Lucy walked away into the brightening day.  

Maggie’s pocket buzzed.  Another one.   _ What the fuck, Veronica? You kept all the money and I’m back to the communal living apartments, what the fuck more do you want?   _ Not that she minded: the communal apartments had a kind of interesting, buzzing-with-life kind of dorm atmosphere, but she’d spent the last two years in Veronica’s  Atenhotep District penthouse.  It was a bit of a culture shock to move back.

It was nine-thirty a.m. and she already had an assault victim on the way to the ER, and a dozen texts from her ex that she wasn’t going to open.  It was going to be that kind of day, apparently.


	6. The Inkin' Temple

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kara comes to the tattoo shop. Lucy Lane shows up with a whole lot of questions.

When Kara came in the front door of the Inkin’ Temple, she was struck first by how very… Alex… the whole place was.  It was somehow fierce and badass, and yet airy and friendly.  The walls in front were lined with a dizzying array of samples of Alex’s art, as well as that of her former DEO colleague and business partner, Susan.  Susan worked mostly in black ink, and specialized in a style that looked a lot like sumi-e, Japanese paintings with clean lines and subtle gradations. Kara didn’t know how, but Susan really managed to make her work look like she had painted it with brushes on paper, not with needles on someone’s body.  The style had more range than Kara would have thought. Susan had a plethora of cranes, ocean waves, dragons, warriors, serene mountainscapes, and even the icons of the Atenist faith;  the sun disc with the rays reaching downward, depictions of Akhenaten and Nefertiti.  

Alex’s art was instantly recognizable.  Kara recognized shades of her style from when they were kids living in Midvale and they used to decorate each other with body paints.  She worked in a variety of styles but she was clearly most comfortable working with strong colors and had a gift for really ornate, complex pieces with lines that interlocked and overlapped and spilled over each other in organized chaos.  And lately, according to an article from the Tribune that was framed on the wall, it seemed she had been getting a bit of attention for her work with metallic inks that she’d developed herself.

Susan saw her first.  She looked up from her array of ink bottles and safety gear and paraphernalia that was spread out on the workstation in front of her and took a breath to give whatever standard “Welcome to Inkin’ Temple” greeting she did when a stranger walked in, but then realized who she was.  They’d met a few times over the years and had been fond of one another despite the fact that they didn’t get to see each other very much.  “Kara!”  She dropped the apron that she’d been folding over the back of her chair and jogged over to give her a bear hug.  Susan was smallish, but she gave great hugs.  “It’s been like, forever.”  

Kara squeezed back.  “Hey Susan.”  She glanced around.  “Nice work,” she said, gesturing to the samples all over the place. 

“I’d offer to do you, but I know Alex won't let me.”

The sound of something being knocked over and then a string of colorful swearing came from the back of the shop.  “You’re not doing my sister!” came Alex’s holler from the back of the shop, which was only closed off from the front by a curtain.  Old-school Salt & Pepa was thumping away back there while Alex was doing who knew what.  She came striding out.  “And you’re not inking her either.”

Kara snorted.  “Idiot.”

“Nerd.”

They hugged for a long time.  Kara had to try really hard not to break her.  

They looked at each other for a minute.  Alex looked relaxed and happy.  Her scientist secret agent sister, who had always had a seriousness to her, a quiet sadness, actually seemed lighter than the last time they’d seen each other.  Owning a tattoo shop seemed to be agreeing with her.   

She inspected Alex’s arms.  They were covered with beautiful sleeves that were clearly Susan’s work; on her right arm, an ocean swirled around her bicep, above which a softly clouded sky hovered.  In the sky, she saw a pair of cranes, surrounded by a ring of kanji characters.  Alex was enough into zen meditation these days that Kara felt pretty sure the characters actually said something.  She touched the cranes.  “Beautiful work, Susan.”

“Thanks.”

Alex smiled, seeming a little embarrassed.  “Yeah, the paired cranes are supposed to represent good luck, but… I also kind of think of them as representing me and Astra.  Because luck doesn’t begin to describe how unlikely it was that we found each other.”

Susan coughed.  “Gay.”  Cough. 

Alex punched her shoulder.  “Shut up.”

Kara smiled.  She was still getting her brain around it, Alex being with her long-lost aunt, but… there it was, in Alex’s face.  A peace, a happiness.  Whatever they had, it seemed to be good for them both.

Kara inspected Susan’s tattoos.  She had sheet music wrapping around one arm from wrist to shoulder.  “What piece is that?” she asked, because she knew enough to know that it wasn’t just random notes.

Susan smiled.  “Chopin’s Nocturne in B Major.  It was my audition piece for Berklee.  It paved the way for everything that’s happened in my life since.”

“Did Alex get all the notes right?” 

They spent a few minutes talking about the process they used to make sure the music was accurate.  Susan unbuttoned her bowling shirt and showed Kara the golden sun disc on her chest.  Alex’s metallic ink had a kind of subtle, matte-finish kind of gleam to it.  Kara had pictured something that looked like glitter, but it was tasteful and gorgeous.  No wonder she’d gotten a write-up.  

Susan glanced at the schedule.  “Listen Al, my first one isn’t until eleven today.  Do you mind if I bug off for a morning service?  I’ll grab some donuts from Zornak’s on the way back.”

Alex shrugged.  “Yeah, ok.  Get me one of the chocolate ones with the bacon, if they have it.”  

Susan split.  “See you later, Kara!”

Kara settled into one of the big, padded chairs.  “So, Susan converted?”

Alex nodded.  “Yeah.  Couple of years ago.  I think she’s in it for the hymns, to tell you the truth, but this town is like sixty percent Atenist and they don’t date outside the faith much, so I think she was hoping to expand her dating pool a little.”

“Did it work?”

Alex just smirked.

Kara plopped down in big black leather chair in front of Alex’s station.  She spun around in a circle.  “So do you seriously think you can tattoo me?  I mean, with my Kryptonian skin and all?”

Alex nodded.  “I’ve been working on it, because Astra wants some ink too.”  She brandished a tattoo gun with a tip that looked different than the others: it was larger, and had some glowing bands around it, leading down to where a rather long needle protruded.  “I use this irradiated needle that will disrupt your skin cells’ cohesion long enough for me to get this specially treated ink into the spaces between.  And hopefully your skin won’t spit it out because if the treatment works right, your body will just accept it the same as a bio-implant.”

Kara was impressed.  Alex was always more of a genius than she really believed herself to be.  “Think it’s gonna work?”

Alex grinned.  “Wanna be my guinea pig?”

Kara smiled.  “OK.  What should I get?”

Alex thought.  “Well, you know the whole story why I started developing the metallics, right?”

Kara shook her head.

Alex tugged the neckline of her tank top down to reveal, on her sternum, a stunning burgundy heart with spiderweb cracks of gold running through it.  

Kara gasped.  “That’s beautiful.”

“Thanks.  Basically, you know, since i got into the Zen meditation, I’ve learned a lot about Japanese culture, and they have this art form, kintsugi, where they use special gold lacquer to repair broken pieces of pottery.  The gold both calls attention to the broken places and then also makes them whole.  The idea is that the piece then becomes more beautiful for having been broken.”  She tugged the neckline back up.  “Needless to say, that spoke to me.”

Kara nodded.  Alex wasn’t the only one who had been broken.  Kara had watched her whole planet go up in flames.  She had lost all her friends and family and the culture that she grew up with.  She went to live with the Danvers family, and then lost them too, first Jeremiah, and then Eliza a few years ago.  She’d been living a closeted life as an alien for a decade now, and she was tired.  She was long past ready to be someplace that allowed her to be herself.

“Anyway, I thought you might like to get something in gold.  You know, for your broken places.”  

Kara smiled, and watched as Alex popped a spent ink cartridge out of the gun.  Kara pointed to her left deltoid and said, “I was actually thinking about a star map?”

Alex made a little face.  “That could be really involved.”

“No no.  It could be really simple.”  She grabbed Alex’s sketchpad and pencil and quickly, inside a little circle, she sketched out a simple map of Rao’s solar system, all twelve planets, with Krypton and Daxam still intact.  A radiant sun in the center and then concentric rings moving outwards.  “See?”

Alex nodded.  “So maybe we fill it in with a nice dark blue, and we do all the line work in gold?”

Kara nodded.  She closed her eyes and flopped deeper into the comfortable chair, while Alex fiddled with her equipment.   

The bells on the front door of the shop rang and a woman came striding in.  Kara saw in her bearing, and in the intensity of her blue eyes, and her full suit of black clothing, that she was military.  Probably DEO, as Alex had been.  “Alex Danvers?”  

Alex looked up.  “Director Lane.”  Her tone was not rude, but she didn’t seem quite happy to see this woman, either.

“Aten’s blessings on you,” she said, inclining her head to both of them. 

“Thanks, back atcha.  This is my sister, Kara.”  

Lane smiled briefly at Kara.  Those eyes … this woman was intense, Kara thought.

Alex looked her over for a moment.  “So, I’m guessing you didn’t come here looking for some new ink.”

Director Lane shook her head.  “No, Agent Danvers.”

Alex smirked.  “I’m not Agent Danvers anymore.  Just Alex, if you don’t mind.”

Director Lane sighed.  “Well, that’s why I’m here, actually.  I’m hoping to coax you out of retirement.”

Alex shook her head.  “Not a chance.  Can’t work for an organization that does the things that made me leave it.”

Director Lane looked regretful at this.  “Look, I wasn’t in charge back then.”  Kara couldn’t believe that a woman as young as she looked could be a director of a government black-ops group.  She nodded toward the back room.  “A word in private?” she asked.

Alex got up.  “Fine, come this way.”

Their retreat to the back room was merely symbolic, since Kara’s hearing could pick up their conversation ten blocks away, let alone in the next room which did not even have a door that closed.

Lane’s voice, firm and sure, but friendly and understanding.  “Look, you know I don’t approve of what was done to Astra.  And I’m making a lot of changes.”

Alex’s voice, then, equally firm, but still respectful.  “I’ve heard things to that effect.”

“It’s all true.  No more torture.  Better dental plan.  Buddhist holidays off.” 

Alex chuckled.  “That’s great.  I don’t really do that side of it, to be honest. It’s just the practice of mindfulness that I like.  It helped me get sober and it’s been keeping me there.”

Kara glanced through the wall then, and saw Lane’s smile, and appreciated how beautiful she actually was.  “How are you doing with that?”  She seemed sincerely interested.

Alex shrugged.  “Still sober.”  She had stopped drinking after leaving the DEO, around the time she’d gotten together with Astra, Kara knew.  She’d been sober for about six months.   Alex paused awkwardly, then:  “Listen, I know you’re not your father.  I don’t hold Astra’s torture against you.  But you gotta understand, I have PTSD about that place at this point.  Not just about what happened to Astra, either.”

“Is she alright, by the way?”

“Thanks for asking.  She’s incredibly strong, but she’s still healing.  Your father injected her with liquid Kryptonite.  That’s basically poison.  She still has nightmares.”  

“Yeah, well, my father wasn’t too keen on her trying to take over the world.”

“Are you defending him?”

“Not at all!  But people in war... they do what they think they have to.  He tortured her, she gave him bad intel that cost us a few good men.”  An uncomfortable pause in which Kara wondered what Lucy had done in war that she thought she had to.  “No, I’m grateful that you were able to convince Astra to betray her husband and pull the plug on Myriad before it got out of hand.  We have enough troubles with that little survivor’s group of Lillian Luthor’s as it is. I thank the Aten that Myriad wasn’t any worse than it was.”

“Well, you know I’m grateful to you for listening to me at that crucial moment and brokering the deal that set her free.  She’s a different person, now.”  Alex’s sigh was heavy.  “Anyway, it isn’t only about what happened to her. It’s also about a lot of things I was asked to do in my time there.  I witnessed torture, I was ordered to do it a couple of times.  I was kidnapped and forced under mind control twice.  I’ve killed people, and not that I feel that I was wrong under the circumstances, but… I shouldn’t have to tell you, of all people, that that can wear on a person.”

“Look, I do understand that.  Believe me.  It’s not as if I’d be so eager to go rushing back into Afghanistan, you know?  But I had to ask.  Your service record was exemplary.  There’s a war brewing with Cadmus, I think.  We’ve seen a spike in crime against alien shop owners in the district.  We need good agents now, more than ever.”

Alex sighed.  “Well, I’m sorry, Director Lane, but that’s not going to be me.”

Lucy sighed.  “What if I can speed along Astra’s naturalization papers?  Have her locator removed early?”

Alex’s hesitation sounded like she was considering it for half a moment.  Everyone with an alien partner worried about naturalization papers.  The law for extraterrestrial residents was relatively permissive, but if you didn’t get fully naturalized, there were a lot of loopholes for the Federal Extraplanetary Immigration Agency to give you a hard time if they felt so inclined.  Alex was a little curt.  “I’ll do you the courtesy of considering it.”

“Thank you.”  A pause, and then:  “There’s one other thing.”

“What’s that?”

“Has Astra been abiding by the no-fly clause in her arrangement?”

“Why wouldn’t she? How would it help her to break the agreement?  Besides, you have her locator data, you could tell me better than I could tell you.”

“Yeah, I know. I could do that.  I just wanted to hear it from you directly.”

“Yeah, well, I’m sure she’s clear, but check her locator data if it’ll make you feel better.”

She walked out of the back with Alex, and inclined her head again to both her and Kara.  “Aten’s light be upon you,” she said. And she departed.

Kara realized then that she’d been holding her breath.  “She was responsible for the deal that let Astra go free?”

Alex nodded.  “She took over at DEO West after they moved my old boss to the downtown office.  She’s a Major in the U.S. Army, high powered lawyer too.  Judge Advocate General’s office.  Her dad’s a famous general.  He was the one responsible for Astra’s torture.”

Kara’s face darkened.  “And they put her in charge?”

“She’s not like him,” Alex assured her.  “It’s because of her that Astra’s alive and that I got to leave with a decent ‘retirement’ package.”

Having the daughter of the man who had tortured one of her only living relatives --one of the only living members of her race, actually -- in charge of a well-outfitted paramilitary organization like the DEO made her uncomfortable.  But she had to admit that it seemed like Lucy was doing her best to do right in an unspeakably bad situation.  “So she’s not like her father, then?”

Alex shook her head.  “No, doesn’t seem that way.  Susan stuck around for a little while after I left, and I sort of got the vibe from her that it’s actually a sore point for Director Lane that she has to constantly prove that she’s not like her dad.”

Kara understood that on some level.  “What no-fly clause?  What locator?  And what the hell is Myriad?”

Alex sighed.  “That’s … a lot to talk about.  It was a plan Astra and Non had to make us all work together to conserve the Earth’s resources and solve all our problems.”

“Make us?”

“Yeah … it would have been a cool plan if it didn’t involve mind control.”  Alex shifted.  “Look, those things are a lot to get into now.  I promise we’ll talk about it more later if you want, but… it’s just a long story, and it’s going to take a while to really explain it.”

Kara thought for a moment.  She had missed out on a large part of her sister’s life.  But Alex seemed pained at the mention of it, so Kara let it go, at least for now.  “So are you going to think about her offer to get you to go back?”

“Nah, I was just being polite.”  Alex tapped the end of the tattoo gun.  “Alright, sis, roll up that sleeve and let’s see if this works like I think it’s going to.”


	7. The Noon Devotional

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kara spreads her wings.

She went home that evening with the solar system of Rao on her deltoid.  It gleamed softly, even now, before the ink had fully settled, and she was proud of it.  It didn’t hurt, wasn’t sore the way it was for humans who went through the process, but Alex still instructed her in its care and maintenance for the first several days.  It did feel a little weird.

While the three of them prepared dinner, she had a chance to finally see Alex and Astra together, and watch the way they quietly understood each other, the way they had, in the time they’d been together, come to understand each other’s rhythms and ways of doing things.  Once she got over the strangeness that came with the collision of one’s worlds, she saw how they lifted each other up.  She listened to their gentle verbal jousting, saw the way Alex would get agitated over something or other and how Astra’s hand on the small of her back would instantly melt her tension away.  They made two massive skillets of stir-fried chicken and vegetables, with enough rice to satisfy the armies of two small countries.  

Over dinner, Kara learned that Astra had become a voracious consumer of not only human food (“Sushi, little one!  And lasagna!  And donuts!”), but human music and art and storytelling.  She was fascinated with humanity’s fragile but fascinating fabrics, the textures of velvet and silk and leather, loved the sounds of German punk and Japanese EDM and the Rolling Stones.  “I wish I had not spent so long in hiding, not tasting and seeing these things,” she remarked at one point, sounding regretful.  After Fort Rozz had crashed on Earth, she had spent nearly a decade underground while she worked on her ill-fated plan to save humanity from itself.

“Everything happens the way it does for a reason,” Alex reminded her, and rubbed her thumb over the back of Astra’s hand, which sat tangled loosely in hers.

They stayed up late talking, the three of them, catching up on each other’s lives.  Astra was so different now from how Kara remembered her, but she still bore a bit of that world-weariness that Kara had been only vaguely aware of as a child.  

But it didn’t escape her notice how that weariness would lift a little when she and Alex would exchange a soft look or hold each other’s hands.  Kara felt a little tug in her gut, wondering if she would find that at some point.  (Her mind wandered for reasons she couldn’t explain to the intense, kind, serious, beautiful Lucy Lane, but she waved it off.)

Finally, at one a.m., Alex announced that it was time to go to sleep.  Kara took a shower, and came out to find Astra making up the couch for her, with blankets and a few large, soft pillows.  They hugged goodnight.  

Kara lay down and shut the lights.  It was good to be with her family again, even though the configuration had changed a little.  She lay awake, lost in thoughts.  What exactly was involved in Myriad?  Did Astra literally have a locator implant?  Was not flying really a part of the deal she’d made with the DEO for her freedom?  Did she really still even know her long-lost aunt?  No, she told herself, no matter the time and distance and everything that had happened in between, she had family on Earth.  Someone who meant more to her than Kal-El.  She settled into a more peaceful mood, until she heard some slightly labored breathing coming from upstairs in the loft.

Kara sighed and put a pillow over her head.  She knew they had sex, she just didn’t particularly want to think about it.

Then she heard Alex whisper, “Astra, we can’t… her hearing is just as good as yours.”

Astra’s whispered reply:  “You are right, we cannot.”  A moment later:  “You preach restraint, and yet your hand–”

“My hand is doing nothing.”

“That is not nothing.”

Kara rolled over and found her backpack.  She took out her phone and popped in some earbuds, determined to go to sleep.  

Then she heard Astra’s voice, barely more than a whisper:  “Please… oh… my starflower, yes…”

Kara groaned quietly, turned up her Sara Barielles, and prayed to Rao to help her ignore the sounds of lovemaking going on up in the loft.  She would, she vowed, be moving out as soon as possible.

  
  
  


****************   
  


  
  


“So,” the brawny little Thai woman went on, while Kara stood in the doorway, “you see it’s very small, but all rooms have private bathrooms.  The common room is big and comfortable, kitchen has all latest appliances, and you share with six other units on the floor.  I’m picky who I rent to, so you have all nice neighbors.  What about you, hm?  What do you do for money?”  She was old, but spry.  She looked like she spent half her days bench pressing city buses.  Her speech was quick, and her English was pretty flawless and not heavily accented, apart from her cadences being a little off.  Kara remembered having that problem when she first got here, too. 

“Well, I just finished school.  I’m looking for work right now, but I have a little money.  My mom left me a bit of a nut when she passed away a couple of years ago, so I’m pretty sure I can float until I find work.”  Kara smiled.

Soonee nodded.  “I see.  Well, I don’t like to rent to people with no job, usually.  You don’t have family or friends who can put you up?”

Kara flushed.  “Well, there’s my sister but, um… I have really good hearing and her place is really small, so she and her girlfriend are … well, let’s just say I hear a lot of things I’d rather not.”

Soonee chuckled with sympathy.  “OK, OK.  Honey, I been there.  You pay upfront, three months, I’ll rent you the room.  Deal?”

Kara thought for a moment.  Eliza had left her and Alex each a bit of money.  She was generally pretty frugal.  She did the math.  Three months really wasn’t that bad.  These communal living apartments were designed for people exactly like her: young, new in town, looking for independence and a little more privacy than a traditional roommate situation, but not able to spend money for an apartment all to themselves.  With the shared common space, she’d meet all kinds of new people.  It was almost like the dorms at Northwestern, she thought, but a little more adult.  And Astra had said that if push came to shove, she could probably get her a gig at the firing range until she found something a little more up her alley.  

“When do you want to move in?” Soonee had her hands planted on her hips, gazing expectantly at Kara.  “Tomorrow?”

Kara considered her for a split second.   _ Oh, my star flower, _ she thought dryly, and shuddered.  “Today?”

Soonee nodded sharply.  “OK.  You give me the check, you can move in tonight.”

Kara had never whipped out her checkbook so fast.

  
  


******

  
  


She left the building with a spring in her step.  She’d been afraid it would be hard to find something affordable.  It was close enough to Alex and Astra’s place that she could stroll there at a leisurely pace and even grab a rice pie from Mago’s truck on the way.  It was the beginning of her post-academic life.  Her landlady seemed decent.  The young adults in the common living room on the floor she had visited seemed neatly-dressed and she’d overheard a conversation about organic chemistry.

And then, she heard the fire sirens. 

They were not close.  They were halfway across town.   _ They probably have it under control.  They don’t need me.  I should just keep walking. _

But that was Jeremiah Danvers’s voice in her head.  Her adoptive father had firmly discouraged her from using her powers after she had freed a woman and her baby from a burning car.  

Her own voice said,  _ But where do I have to be right now?  What do I have to do?  What if I can help?   _ This was a different voice, one that she had heard in her head a few times since she’d returned from that study abroad semester in Greece.  The voice of a friend she’d made there, who had passionately advocated for her to stop hiding her powers.  That, she decided, was the voice that she would listen to today.  And she leapt into the air, scanning the tops of the building for the trouble that was rousing the sirens.

She saw the thin column of smoke rising from a block close to the Temple of Aten.  She soared over the city to its source:  a four-story library at the edge of an open plaza.  The embossing on the front said it was the National City Science Council Library.  And it was definitely on fire.

They had already cleared the lower floors of the building and, and they were succeeding in putting out the fires down there, but she heard a frantic young woman pleading with one of the firefighters to help her boss, who was up in the rare books library on the fourth floor.  

His face was already sooty and sweat-drenched; clearly, he’d been in and out of that building at least once in the course of his rescue efforts.  “Miss,” he said, trying to calm her, “the stairs are compromised, but we’re going to try and get her out.  Do you think she’s able to break a window up there?”

They looked up.  The young woman pointed at the top floor.  Kara circled around to the other side of the building.  The heat was screwing with her vision but she was able to see someone on the top floor, on the far side of the building.  She was also able to see that she was not moving much.  The smoke had probably incapacitated her.  Kara took a running leap and made a graceful arc through the air, aiming herself at a window about twenty feet over from where the woman lay.  Kara would have to walk through some fire, but she didn’t want to spray broken glass all over her.  She came smashing through it with a spray of glass and wood splinters.  She saw the woman immediately, and ran through the flames, to her side.  

The heat and the smoke had clearly rendered her barely conscious.  “Just hold on, I’ve got you,” Kara assured her, and her heart hammered in her ears.  

She scooped the limp, coughing woman up in her arms, walked toward the window, and after quickly glancing below to make sure nobody was in the street immediately below her, kicked it out with another spray of glass.  

“Did you just kick out the window?” the woman mumbled against Kara’s shoulder.

“Yeah,” Kara answered calmly.  “You’re going to be okay.”

It didn’t escape Kara’s notice that even with the soot on her face, this was an incredibly beautiful woman.  “What’s your plan?”  Even in her current state, she was lucid enough to ask questions like this.  Kara was mildly impressed.

“I’m going to jump out, holding you in my arms just like you are now.”

“Oh…”  Her eyes closed for a second.  “Won’t we die?”

“No, it’ll be fine.”

And then, as Kara was preparing to take flight out of the window, the woman’s eyes must have opened because she remarked, “That’s a very pretty tattoo, I’ve never seen…”  And then she swooned a bit.

It was then that she realized that her shirt sleeves had been singed to nothing when she walked through the fire, and that her shirt tails were smoldering away.

Kara carefully floated them out of the window and then descended to the sidewalk.  A few people, including some firefighters, and the young woman who had been worrying for her boss, saw her and ran over.  Kara handed the woman’s limp body to one of the firemen.  “She needs oxygen.”

The young woman was grabbing her rescuee’s hand.  “Miss Luthor.  Miss Luthor?”

“She’s okay,” Kara assured her.  “She just needs medical attention.”

Another young, bespectacled woman buzzed around anxiously in the background, mostly staring up at the building and muttering, “I don’t understand it… the systems should have caught it before it got this bad…”

Kara tried to pull away, but then Miss Luthor opened her eyes, and grabbed at Kara’s wrist.  “Wait… the scrolls of Panehesy are in that room … the originals… they’re irreplaceable… can you get them?”

Kara’s brow furrowed.  Artifacts of the Atenist faith.  She had nothing left of her own faith, her own sun god, she realized suddenly, and she was moved that this woman was barely conscious but still found the will to concern herself with these things.  “If they're still intact,”she promised, “I’ll get them.”

“Are you crazy?” the fireman demanded as Kara looked up toward the top floor, preparing to leap back up there.  “You can’t go back up there, it’s–”

“It’s okay,” she called over her shoulder as she streaked through the air toward the inferno, “I’m fireproof!”

She floated back in through the broken window and glanced around the room, which was rapidly filling with flame.  She realized she had not the first idea what the scrolls of Panehesy looked like, so she grabbed two loose ones that sat on a table, tossed them into a set of hardwood shelves that were filled with similar looking papyrus scrolls (actual papyrus! Was that even still a thing?) and with a resigned sigh, lifted the entire shelving unit off of the floor and exited the large double window with it hoisted over her head.

At this moment, the noontime chimes began blaring across the town’s tremendous speaker relay system, letting its denizens know that it was time for the noon devotional.  In her peripheral vision, she was aware of everyone in the park across from the library kneeling in the grass, shrugging their shirts and jackets off of their shoulders to bare them to the sun, and more than a few removing their tops entirely.  A strange quiet settled over the city below her, except for the persistent voice of the chimes.  

The whole effort had taken a bit more than she expected, what with trying to protect the scrolls as she exited the window with them, and then taking great care not to tip the shelves on her way down and send any of the presumably delicate artifacts tumbling to the ground where who knew what might happen to them.  Annoyingly, the back of her shirt was now on fire, and it wasn’t particularly painful, of course, but she was going to be out a shirt when she was done, and she worried a little about the flames damaging her precious cargo.  She heard a girl’s voice down below on the pavement murmur in breathless awe, “Holy crap, I can’t see anything but abs and fire.”

But she carefully descended, floating down from the top floor, the shelves in her arms, to the sounds of the devotional chimes blaring across the city, wreathed in flame that she could, at present, do little about.

But she made it to the ground, placing the shelves on the sidewalk.  She smelled overwhelmingly of singed cotton.  She glanced around.  Many of the faithful in the area were on their knees, shirts still shrugged off their shoulders, staring at her as though she were a god or a ghost. 

She realized that her shirt was more of a ruin than a garment and her khakis weren’t in much better shape.  She also realized with some chagrin that she was being stared at, and that she may have made a bit more of a spectacle of herself than she intended.

“What’s your name?” Miss Luthor’s assistant was asking.

“Who are you?” some other bystander wanted to know.

“How did you do this?” one of the firemen demanded.

She really didn’t want to be thanked or have her name or her face splashed all over the place.  Jeremiah’s discretion still lingered in her thoughts.  “Just one of the good guys!” she exclaimed over her shoulder, and she took to the sky.


	8. Abs of Fire

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lena, alive and in one piece after her ordeal at the library.

Lena woke up in a bright, sun-drenched room in Atenhotep General of West National City.  The insides of her lungs felt raw.  The events of the afternoon were coming back in jumbled bits and pieces.  She recalled the fire alarms.  She recalled being unable to breach the door to the rare book room where she had fallen asleep with her head on a table, because it was quiet up there and she’d had too many days with insufficient rest.  And then she recalled a lot of things that seemed a bit less reliable.  She recalled being carried out of a window in the arms of an impossibly strong blonde woman who had a tattoo in dark blue and gold, of a solar system that Lena didn’t recognize.  She remembered being held in the arms of a fireman and pleading with the woman to go back for the scrolls.  She remembered Ellen, the librarian, buzzing around behind her, muttering about how she didn’t understand why the building’s systems didn’t contain the fire.  And she remembered a lot of oohing and ahhing after that, but she wasn’t sure why.

And then, oxygen masks on her face.  The ambulance.  Doctors muttering to each other, and she kept trying to contribute to the conversation–  Damn you, I don’t need a tetanus shot, just clean the wound with an ultrasound mist!– but she didn’t have the wherewithal to talk to them.  But they had quickly and aggressively given her morphine, she guessed, given the way her mind was riding away onto the ether like a hot air balloon on a massive updraft.

Her assistant, Jess, would have to hold the fort until Lucy arrived.

Which, she realized as she slowly came round, she had done.

“Oh, praise Aten, you’re awake!”

Lena grunted a little and tried sitting up.  Nope, too much work.  “Yeah, sort of.”  She groped around for the controller that would push her into a more upright position. 

Lucy was pacing back and forth at the foot of the bed, but as soon as Lena opened her eyes, she descended upon her, careful not to knock out her IV, and took her hand.  “How did you get stuck upstairs?”

Lena shook her head.  “I had literally passed out with my face in an open scroll, and I woke up with the room full of smoke, the alarms going off, and I couldn’t get the damn doors open.”   


Lucy’s brow furrowed.  “I told you not to go downtown,” she scolded.

“Do you really think that’s helpful right now?” Lena answered, gently, but irritated.

Chastened, Lucy took a breath and seemed to recalibrate, the way she did when Lena was able to get her to see she was thinking about something the wrong way.  “Sorry,” she sighed.  “Jess called me as soon as they got you out of the building.”

Lena blinked.  How exactly had she gotten out?  She was carried out by a woman with a tattoo.  But how?  Did they climb down?  Her memory of floating down simply had to be wrong.  “How… how did I get down?”

Lucy stared at her.  “You really don’t remember?”

Lena shook her head.  “Not in any way that I trust.”

Lucy took a breath.  “Someone flew you down.  In their arms.  And then whoever she was, she went back up for the scrolls and flew down with a whole shelving unit full of them.”   


“When you say flew…”

“I mean, flew.  Like Superman.  It’s all over the news.  The librarian… what’s her name?  Ellen?  Her video of the mystery blonde floating down from the fourth floor, on fire, with a shelving unit full of scrolls, and the noontime devotional chimes blaring, has already gone viral on youtube.”

Lucy took out her phone and showed her the clip; she watched, soundless, an angelic figure, carefully descending with the shelves, flames spreading upwards into the air like wings from her back.  “Why… why is the video called ‘Abs of Fire’?”

Then the phone’s camera zoomed in a bit and her rescuing angel’s shirt had burned away partially, revealing an admittedly impressive set of abs.  Lena chuckled.  “Poor thirsty Ellen.  She needs a girlfriend.”

“Yeah if you have the sound on, you can hear her screaming about them.  I figured I’d spare you.”

They both laughed a little.  But then Lena turned serious.  “You know, I do remember one thing,” she began cautiously.  “I do remember Ellen wondering how the library’s systems didn’t nip things in the bud sooner.  And she’s right.  They’re pretty comprehensive.”  They both shared a long, serious look.  “We can’t eliminate the possibility that my mother had something to do with this.”

Lucy’s face darkened.  “Your mother has been known to do some very questionable things, but an attempt on your life?”

Lena shrugged.  “Maybe it wasn’t really about me.  What if she’s just trying to get at you?  What if she knows about us?  I mean, it wouldn’t be that hard to find out if she wanted to know.”

She watched a storm cloud descend on Lucy’s brow.  She watched Lucy’s jaw begin to work and her knuckles go white.  Maybe it wasn’t a great idea to suggest it, but she couldn’t rule out the possibility.  

“But,” she added, “we don’t know for a fact that it was her, and Aten knows, there are certainly plenty of people who have it in for me just because of my family name.”

“What about your brother?” Lucy suggested, relaxing only a little.  Lena knew, unfortunately, that the only reason Lucy relaxed at all was because Lex was a supermax prison and she knew how to get at him to make him suffer, if it was in fact his work somehow.  

Lena shrugged.  “We don’t know.  We have to let the NCPD do their work.”

“I know a detective in the science division.  I’ll make some calls.”  Lucy had shifted, her mood now one of impatient focus.

Perhaps it was because Lena had been so long accustomed to being a target, but she had a certain clear-headedness about the possibility of her own death.  She had learned how to defend herself –and Lucy knew that for a fact because she’d seen it– and done all she could reasonably do to keep herself safe, but at the same time?  If it was her time, it was her time.  

But Lucy could never tolerate that about her.  She was always determined to do more to protect her, and while at times it was touching, sometimes it was a little stifling.   _ If I’m not living, what good does it do me to be alive? _ Lena would say to her.  And Lucy would try, she would try to release her hold a little.

“Just let them do their jobs, Luce,” Lena said gently.  

Lucy tried to smile at her, but it was more of a furrowed-brow grimace.  “I don’t understand you.  I’m finding it very difficult not to lose my damn mind right now.”

Lena smiled, though.  “I’m telling you, woman, working underground in that bunker is no good for you.”

“Your devotional lamps help, though,” Lucy argued. After Lucy’s first couple of weeks working in the DEO bunker, Lena had developed a set of lamps for Lucy’s office that mimicked actual sunlight.  It was something a cut above the types of lamps used for Seasonal Affective Disorder, as it included various low-level UV spectra, in particular UV-B, which stimulated Vitamin D production.  Lucy, who had been dragging herself home every day utterly depressed, felt an immediate improvement in her mood, and on days when she couldn’t make her way up through the levels of rock and dirt to get out into the sun and do her midday devotional, she simply turned the lamps all the way up and did it in her office.  It wasn’t quite the same, but The Aten could not be disappointed in her; she was fighting for justice.  She didn’t choose to locate the fight underground.

“Yes, but they’re not magic.  I think you should really consider trying to get moved to the downtown office and have Henshaw moved back to the West location.”  She squeezed Lucy’s hand.  “It’s no good for you to be cooped up down there.  It’s not natural.” 

Lucy leaned down and kissed Lena’s forehead at this, sighing.  “I don’t know about that.  I’ve just finally got things the way I want them down there.  I’ve finally won these people’s loyalty and trust.  You have to have unit cohesion or you’re fucked.  It’s not like running a corporation.  You can’t just swoop in and swoop out.”  

Lena nodded.  “I understand that.  And I’m so proud of what you’ve done down there.  You’ve really turned things around.”  In just six months, Lucy had walked into a team which had greeted her with suspicion, and created a whole new atmosphere.  Under Lena’s gentle advice, Lucy took to learning the names of everyone’s spouses and significant others, what faiths they followed and what holidays they needed off, made a point of team-building outside of work like taking staff for dinner or drinks, and other things like this, which brought them around.  Lucy cared, Lena knew.  She had so much love in her.  Lena just helped her convey that love to the people under her command in a way that they would understand it.

So when she ran the ship tightly, and didn’t brook dissent, and didn’t stand for torture as a technique to gain information, and a dozen other things that this black-ops crew wasn’t quite accustomed to, they were more inclined to trust her because she had demonstrated her loyalty to them.  She had made things more humane, but also, in winning their loyalty, had considerably consolidated her power within the department, which was how she liked it.  

Plus it didn’t hurt that Lena sent Lucy to work with some extremely cool gadgetry sometimes that the agents would be practically elbowing each other out of the way to play with.

“Thank you,” Lucy sighed, and stroked Lena’s messy hair.  “I couldn’t have done it without you, you know.”

Lena nodded.  “I know.”

“Modest.”

“Of course.”

Lena thought for a minute.  “You know, it was a really unusual tattoo she had…”

“Who?”

“The superwoman who rescued me.”

“Would you recognize it if you saw it again?”

Lena nodded vigorously.  “Oh, yeah.  It was a solar system, but not Earth’s.  And it was shiny, like a metallic gold.  It looked almost like she had gold inlaid into her skin.”

Lucy raised an eyebrow.  “Gold?  Hm.  My NCPD contact gave me an incident report yesterday on a perp with copper tattoos that were the same thing.  Shiny, metallic.”

“Weird.  Must be some new thing.”

They both pondered for a few moments more.  

Lena took a breath.  “I know you’re going to hate this idea–”

“I’m not calling Lois.”

“But she’s dating Superman!  The odds that he might have some idea who this woman was, don’t you think, are pretty–”

“I’m not calling my sister.  We’ll do this without her.  I have other Kryptonians I can talk to.”

Lena shook her head.  Her stubborn Lucy.  Lucy respected her tremendously but, faith alive, when she did not want to listen, she simply did not want to listen and there was nothing for it.  “Alright.  It was just a thought.  I just… you know, the flying, and the fireproof, and the…”

“I’m not calling Lois.”

Lena laughed.  “One day, you two need to patch things up.”

“When you patch things up with Lex.”

“Lois isn’t homicidal.”

“No,” Lucy snorted.  “But she makes  _ me _ homicidal.”

Lena laughed a little, and then coughed for a few minutes.  Lucy placed a hand on her back while she did.  For all of Lucy’s hovering, and her protective anger, there was nobody else she’d want beside her bed just now.  Lena’s entire life had been a study in wanting love and not receiving it, and when Lucy came in and gave her that, selflessly and without hesitation, Lena had decided fairly quickly that she’d better marry her.  It had been two years, and she was still convinced it was the best decision she’d ever made.


	9. Milkshakes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kara's family responds to her heroism. Kara gets more fame than she'd expected, and finds herself a job.

Alex had already gotten  home by the time Kara arrived back at the apartment.  She and Astra were sitting next to each other on barstools in the kitchen, cackling at something on Alex’s phone, when Kara walked in.  The smells of something delicious wafted from the stovetop.

“What’s up, guys?” Kara asked casually, tossing her hair and acting as though she were not rolling up into the place in clothes that were half-burned off of her.  She was holding a small aloe plant that she’d picked up on her way home from a cute little flower shop down by the piers.  She presented it to Astra without comment, but Astra didn’t take notice because something else was holding her attention.  

“ _ ‘What’s up?’ _  Are you seriously asking me that, Ms. Flaming Abs?”  Alex snorted.

Kara wrinkled her nose.  “What?”

“I know that you said you were tired of hiding who you were, but Jesus, Kara.”  Alex was still grinning.

Kara still didn’t understand.  “What?”

Astra smiled.  “Little One.  You pulled this Luthor woman from a fire and then rescued their books as well.  You are a hero now, like Kal-El.”

Kara snorted.  “I’m  _ not _ like Kal-El.  Anyone with my abilities would have done what I did.  I don’t get why he has to be so showy about it.”

“Yeah but his suit is fireproof!” Alex hooted.  “Your little button-down from Sears wasn’t and now the Internet knows what your abs look like!  Not to mention you came drifting down from the fourth floor, on fire, with the noontime devotional chimes blaring.”  She was clearly too entertained to be put out.  “Seems to me you’re the one being showy.”

Astra, one hand still resting absently on Alex’s shoulder, gave Kara an amused look.  “You have gone viral.  There is video taken by a woman who does quite a bit of yelling about your … musculature.”

Kara finally blushed a little.  

“The Tribune has already christened you The Burning Angel.”

“Burning Angel?”

But she remembered again what her friend in Greece had told her: let your light shine, and the rest will take care of itself.  

“Yeah.”  Alex shook her head.  “You dramatic asshole.”

“Well, I’m not planning on suiting up, if that’s what you’re worried about,” Kara retorted.  “I’m just letting my light shine.  Things will fall into place the way they’re supposed to.”

“Letting your light shine…”  Astra grumbled, shaking her head. “Change into some not-burned clothing, Shining-Light Zor-El,” she commanded, “and have dinner with us.  I have made tacos.”

“I think,” Alex decided as she pulled plates from the cabinets, “I know what your next tat is going to be.  Shoulder blades.  Pair of flaming golden wings.”  

Kara put her hands on her hips and prepared to argue.

Alex stopped her.  “Don’t, Kara.  Look, you… you did a good thing, okay?  Just… just be careful.”

Kara frowned.  She knew Alex was never going to not worry about her.  Alex worrying about her was baked into the foundations of their relationship, when Eliza and Jeremiah had made it her job, and it had continued throughout their adult lives.  “I’m glad you’re not mad.  I thought you’d freak out.”

Alex gave her a wry smile.  “I have no room to yell at you about taking risks.  I was a secret agent, remember?  Anyway, I’m doing this new thing now, being happy and respecting people’s life choices.  So.”

Kara knew, too, that Eliza being gone in some sense freed Alex from the obligation of keeping Kara’s powers under wraps, but there was no point getting into that now.  She gave Alex a quick hug, then changed her clothing and sat down to dinner.

As they ate, she informed them, “So I found a place in one of those communal living apartment buildings.  I’m moving in tonight.”

Alex frowned.  “Are you sure you want to blow your money like that before you find a job?”

“Yes,  _ Star Flower _ , I’m sure,” Kara jabbed.  “Some of us like to sleep.”

It was Alex’s turn to redden, and Astra simply frowned.  “Little One–”

Kara held up the free hand that wasn’t currently engaged with her crispy taco.  “Don’t,” she said around a mouthful of hot beef. Her tone softened.  “I don’t wanna cramp you guys’s style.  It’ll be much better for everyone if I have a place of my own to stay.  It doesn’t mean I’m going to stop hanging around.  It’s just better if we have our own places to sleep.”

Everyone agreed.  And then they went back to the shop, and Kara got her wings.

  
  


***********

  
  


Events unfolded quickly after that.  From that week’s Tribune, these headlines came in rapid succession:

**“Lena Luthor Rescued from Library Fire by Mysterious ‘Burning Angel’.”**

**“Burning Angel Pulls Three Oil Workers From a Tanker Fire.”**

**“Burning Angel Puts Out Forest Fire, Stops Fire Chopper From Crashing”**

Predictably, each event was accompanied by photographs that were, for her fans,  frustratingly vague, either because her face was obscured by something absurdly large that she was carrying, or because she was being photographed through flames and clouds of smoke.  

After each rescue, she would acquire a new tattoo.  Some were related to her rescues (a sequoia tree after her exploits in the forest fire), but many would often just be whatever she and Alex wanted (Bohr’s model of the hydrogen atom, the names of her family in Kryptonese);  Alex’s way of rewarding her for doing something good in the world.  On the inside of her forearm, Alex inscribed a favorite Shakespeare quote of Kara’s that had always reminded Alex of her:  “Too rich for use, for Earth too dear”.

Youtube theory videos popped up and proliferated like yeast spores.  Buzzfeed listicles popped with titles like “ **Top 10 Nicknames for National City’s Newest Heroine”** and  **“Seven Golden Tattoos You Didn’t Know the Burning Angel Had”.** Ellen the NCSC librarian started a blog devoted to poetry about The Burning Angel.  It got out of hand quickly, if Kara was being honest with herself.

 

The headlines continued, not just the Tribune but the Times and the Intelligencer, too:

**“Bus Full of School Children Pulled From Collapsing Bridge, Driver is Convinced It was Burning Angel”**

**“Is Burning Angel Not Limiting Herself to Fires Anymore?”**

**“Burning Angel Rescues Cablecar Passengers After Motor Failure”**

**“Burning Angel Lays Fifteen House Foundations For Habitat for Humanity, Fortunately No Flames In Sight”**

  
  


Not to mention accounts splashed across Twitter and tumblr:

**“You guys, The Burning Angel helped my grandma across the street this morning and I am dying”**

**“Ok but The Burning Angel Refroze My Son’s Ice Cream With Her Freeze-Breath.  If you have anything bad to say about her just fight me.”**

**“So, my mom was literally in tears for like an hour last night because she couldn't get my little brother’s IKEA bed together and then the Burning Angel appeared and assembled it”.** Inevitably there were before and after photos of the bed, but the poster claimed that the Burning Angel moved too fast to photograph her putting the bed together.

 

Over the space of a few weeks, she had become a fixture in the local papers, and was gaining some national attention, but she still didn’t have a job.  It was nice though; especially when she was wearing something sleeveless so that her tattoos showed, people would sometimes recognize her and give her free food or flowers or newspapers.  Mago would sometimes slip her a couple of rice pies in the morning if she happened to walk past his truck.  She knew she ought to be going on more job interviews, because she didn’t want to use up all her savings, but she also knew that Eliza would hardly be upset that she was using that money to help people.

She liked life in the communal apartments and had become a little bit friendly with some of her neighbors, who were, as Soonee had promised, both nice and smart.  Because of the shared setup, it was inevitable that she'd strike up conversation with someone else while they were cooking breakfast or watching television.  She particularly liked that cute little detective who lived two doors down and watched Mystery Science Theater 3000 with her a couple of times.

Still, she had to occasionally go on interviews, wearing tidy little skirts and cardigans that covered her rapidly proliferating tattoos.  She wasn't exactly hiding, but she figured she didn't want to look like she was trying to trade on her heroism to get a lab gig.

It was on one such morning, as she strolled through the bustling midtown business district, looking for the address of a prospective employer, her eye caught upon an attractive mother and her preteen son standing at the edge of curb, debating whether to cross at that corner or the next.  The boy seemed intent on crossing there because he had his eye on the milkshake truck on the opposite corner.  The blonde woman was shaking her head and pointing further down the street.  She looked vaguely familiar to Kara, as though she were somewhat famous and someone she ought to know, but she was maybe failing to recognize her because she was out of context.  Kara’s eyes caught, even from halfway down the block, that the boy held in his right hand a genuine Golden Pikachu card.   _ How much had that thing had to have cost? _ she wondered.  She started in their direction, because she was curious to see one up close (she never had).  And then a truck rumbled past, and the strong breeze that it left in its wake tugged the card from the boy’s hand.  She saw him scramble after it, and stumble off of the curb.

Time froze, the way it did for Kara in those moments, and she darted between the cars, across the street, snatching both the boy and Pokemon card out of the path of an oncoming bus.  She deposited him back onto the curb safe and sound, and handed him his card back.  

“What the–?” he began.

“Golden Pikachu,” she said breathlessly, grinning at him. “Nice.  Must have cost your mom a fortune.”

“Carter Grant!” his mother cried, dashing over to him.  “You could have been killed!  It’s just a Pokemon card!”

“It  _ is _ a really rare one,” Kara offered, by way of trying to bring some levity.  

The woman embraced her son and squeezed him hard for a moment, the relief visible on her face, then released him and turned to look at Kara, hands on her hips.  “And you,” she remarked, after her eyes quickly flicked over Kara and seemed like they were taking in every detail of her.  “Where the hell did you come from?  Well, no matter, I owe you something, don’t I.”

Kara grinned.  “Anyone would have done that,” she assured her.

“I assure you, anyone would  _ not _ have done that.  Anyone  _ could not _ have.  So, if there’s anything I can do to thank you…”

Then it hit her.  Kara realized who this woman was.   _ Carter Grant, _ she’d said to her son.  This was Cat Grant, celebrated pundit and media mogul, owner of CatCo, CatTV, the Tribune and a number of other national papers and glossy magazines.  “Actually,” she said, a little hesitantly, “I  _ am _ looking for a job right now.”

Cat Grant, hands still planted on her hips, gave Kara another once-over.  Kara felt that she had never felt so thoroughly assessed by someone.  It wasn’t in a remotely sexual way, but it still felt strange to be so … inspected.  She felt like she was being sussed out, from top to bottom, in an instant.  “Well,” Cat decided after a moment, “I may be able to help you.  What are your qualifications, apart from snatching errant children from the jaws of death?”

Kara shrugged.  “Um, I speak six languages, and I have a double masters in Creative Writing and Quantum Particle Physics?”

Cat Grant nodded slowly.  “Is that so?  And where are you going now?”

Kara thought about the job that she didn’t really want that she was on her way to interview for.  She decided she’d rather go wherever Cat Grant was headed.  “Nowhere special.”

Cat nodded.  “Good.  Come with us.  How do you feel about milkshakes?”

Kara grinned again.  “I love them.”

“Good.”  She pointed down the block.  “This way.”


	10. Go Ahead and Burn It

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Maggie does some police work.

The National City Police Department’s Science Division was not a particularly well-understood branch of the force.  It was not, as some people assumed, a forensics department.  Its caseload was small, and similar to the DEO, was mostly focused on alien-related matters, because the G-Men needed an agency within the city’s PD that they could deal with easily and directly.  If some hot-shot general or colonel needed to find out what was going on, it was simply impractical and possibly dangerous for them to have to wade through all of the city’s ninety-six precincts looking for the one dealing with the issue that was of interest to them. The moniker science division was meant to imply that its mission was mostly the securing of alien hardware and biotech, though in truth it always ended up being more than that, and for a department that dealt mostly with aliens, Maggie’s people skills were far more of an asset than the division’s brass were willing to admit.  They respected her results, though, so she was generally given enough rope to do what she needed to do without hanging herself.

The division had scientists, yes, but that was not what she was.  She was a plainclothes detective, and a good one.  She understood enough about science to know what was probably of interest to those in the division who were scientists, and kept a pretty meticulous record of her crime scenes.  Her bosses generally told her that her case files were immaculate and thorough.

So when she’d gotten assigned to look into the fire at the Science Council Library, she’d balked a little.  It wasn’t alien, and it wasn’t science.  Why was this coming to her?  Because, her boss replied, Lena Luthor almost got killed, and it had the markings of foul play.  Since there was no longer a Special Investigations Unit (it had been dissolved a few years ago due to corruption), it was being handed to the science division under the thin rationale that Lena Luthor’s family had a lot of alien enemies and that one of them could possibly, maybe have had something to do with the fire.  Maggie accepted this explanation without complaint, because complaining never did any good anyhow.

She had to admit, that on review, it did appear sketchy.  Firstly, the witness statement from the librarian who was responsible for the rare books room made a lot of the fact that the building’s fire prevention systems were pretty advanced.  The librarian also found it highly dubious that Lena Luthor had fallen asleep so hard that the alarms did not wake her sooner.  Ellen Schultz had known Lena Luthor for six years, apparently, since she’d graduated college, and knew her to be a workaholic, but an intensely healthy one, and not given to just passing out with her head on the table if she had work to do.

The secretary’s statement corroborated that notion.  “I’ve seen her sleep-deprived before,” the report quoted her as saying, “but she’ll just power nap, and there is no way she would ever sleep so deeply that she would literally sleep through fire alarms.”

So Maggie sighed, and thought.  The obvious next step was to take a look at the blood work.

The carbon monoxide counts were really high, but that wasn’t surprising for smoke inhalation.  She called the hospital.

“Emergency Room, this is Claire,” the nurse on duty answered.

“This is Detective Maggie Sawyer, NCPD Science Division.  I’m looking at the labs from when Lena Luthor was in there the other day after the library fire.  I saw you guys did standard blood work on her and tested for carbon monoxide but did you do a full toxicology workup?  I don’t see it in what we got from you guys.”

The nurse paused for a moment while she tapped away on her computer.  “I was actually on duty that day,” she said.  “Yeah, she came in for smoke inhalation, we wouldn’t have done a full toxicology.  We just checked the CO levels to make sure she wasn’t in serious danger, you know, nerve damage and the like.”

Maggie sighed.  “Well, any chance you can work with the samples you have and give me even a minimal toxicology report?  I have suspicion of foul play but it’ll help me if I can prove she was drugged in some way.”

The nurse sighed.  “This is the kind of thing I’m gonna have to put you through to my shift manager for…”

So Maggie hacked her way through three levels of management to find out whether the remaining samples of Lena’s blood could be tested for anything that might have knocked her out before the fire started.  Finally, after getting run in circles for a while, she tried a different tactic.  She called the hospital’s office of public relations.  

“Listen,” she said with threatening calm, “I am going to make it very public that the hospital is impeding an investigation for foul play in the case of the fire of the Science Council Library.  Do you really want every Atenist in National City angry at you?  Because that’s going to be some really bad PR.”

Within the hour, she had a promise that they would try to have a basic toxicology back to her by the next day.  Maggie requested that, if it turned out that they didn’t have enough sample to do a full workup, they should test first for fentanyl, as that had turned up a few times lately in cases she’d looked at.  One of the shopkeeps in the alien district had been gassed with fentanyl before his place was knocked over.  The stuff was effective, if it was handled correctly it came and went without doing permanent damage, and because it was often used for surgeries, it could be gotten through medical channels, which could help her narrow down where it came from.  They were practically tripping over themselves to assure her that they would do as she asked.

Calling the public relations department when the department you wanted wasn’t cooperating was a trick she had learned from her ex.  Veronica was the most expensive bauble Maggie had ever worn on her arm, but the woman knew from cheap tricks, and when it came to manipulating public opinion, she had a Kate Spade bag full of them.

As if the bitch could feel Maggie thinking about her, a text vibrated her phone in her pocket.  She pulled it out.   _ Maggie, I still have one of your leather jackets.  I thought you might want it back. _

Maggie knew perfectly well she hadn’t left any of her leather jackets at Veronica Sinclair’s tony penthouse overlooking the water.  And if she had, she sure didn’t want it back now.   _ Great _ , she texted back,  _ go ahead and burn it. _

  
  
  


***********

  
  


Maggie suspected that her new floormate was the Burning Angel.

While the accounts of the Angel’s height and other features varied some, she was definitely blonde, definitely had great abs, and definitely had gold tattoos of some sort, probably similar to the copper ones one her mystery assailant from the district assault a few weeks ago. 

They’d hung out watching Mystery Science Theater a few times now.  Maggie made popcorn and, being vegan, she relied on popcorn a lot for snacking and so, had raised it to something more of an art form than what was available in the selection of microwave popcorn at the store.  She popped real kernels in a hot-air popper and she had a collection of spritzers and shakers full of delightful things to flavor it.  Kara had announced her favorite so far was when she spritzed it with a little soy sauce and sprinkled some garlic powder on it, but Maggie hadn’t even gotten around to some of her signature combinations yet.

Maggie talked about work, and how much she liked National City, despite being a lapsed Catholic in a town that was so heavily flavored by its faith.  She talked about being queer and Latina in Nebraska and she talked about the local music scene in town which, in her estimation, was pretty good.

Kara talked about her double masters degrees in physics and creative writing.  She talked a fair bit about her semester in Greece and cliff-diving in Santorini and the friend she’d made there, who sounded like she had maybe been a girlfriend but Maggie didn’t pry.  

It was actually one evening after work that Maggie happened on Kara doing the dishes with her sleeves rolled up.  “Hey Danvers,” she called, sauntering over.  She caught the gleam of gold on Kara’s arms and walked closer.  There were a number of gold tattoos all over her forearms.  “NIce tats,” she remarked casually.  “What’s that one?”

Kara held up her wrist.  “Bohr’s model of a hydrogen atom.”

“Nerd.”

Kara grinned.  

Maggie inspected what she could see for a few moments more.  A Shakespeare quote, what looked like some pretty advanced math, and some writing that she couldn’t quite make out.  “What’s that?” she asked, pointing to the lines of odd script on the inside of her other wrist.

Kara smiled, a little less brightly.  “Those are the names of my family.”

Maggie frowned.  “Are they… are they in Greek?”  That didn’t seem right either; semester in Greece or not, Kara didn’t seem particularly Greek and besides, she’d seen Greek characters before and that didn’t seem to be what she was looking at.

Kara smiled, a little mischievous, and answered,  “Yeah, my sorority at Northwestern was really hardcore.”

Maggie chuckled a little.  An awkward pause followed.  She didn’t volunteer any more.  Maggie shifted tacks, since she was really more interested in what those tattoos meant for her case.  “You know, I’ve got an open case at work and there’s a person of interest we’re looking for who supposedly has metallic tats like that.  Where’d you get ‘em?”

Kara’s demeanor buoyed again.  “My sister does them.  She’s got a shop near the gay district.  The Inkin’ Temple.  Maybe you know it?”  

Maggie shook her head.  “Nope, but I’ll go check it out.”  She slapped Kara on the back.  

Kara wiped her hands on her khakis and pulled her phone out of her pocket.  “Great,” she said cheerfully, “I’ll let her know you’re coming.”

“Thanks.”  After a moment of waiting while Kara composed her text, Maggie jokingly asked, “Is she hot?”

Kara shrugged.  “I dunno.”

“Is she single?”

“Not really.”

Another moment passed while Kara muttered words under her breath as she texted them.  “...she’s really….cool…. If you…. Could … maybe …. Stop … refrigerator… underdog...”

Maggie puzzled for a moment over this.  Sibling language, she guessed.

Kara put away her phone.

“Say,” Maggie asked,  “how’d your interview go?”

Kara smiled.  “Well, I never made it.  I got held up.”  She paused then, and Maggie thought she looked just a bit sly as she said it.  “But I happened to run into Cat Grant, and she happened to offer me a job writing the Trib’s science column.  Should be fun.”

“What do you mean, you ran into her?”

“I met her.  On the street.”

“She offered you a job after you ran into her on the street?”

“Well, I pulled her son out of the path of an oncoming bus.”

Maggie chuckled.  “Do that a lot, do you?”

Kara finished drying the saucepan she was rinsing and placed it in the drain.  “Nah.  Just once in awhile when the mood strikes.  You know how it is.”  She winked.  

Maggie looked at her arms again.  That script wasn’t Greek… it had to be alien.  Most aliens didn’t have powers, but some did, like Superman.  The Angel’s powers were a  _ lot _ like Superman’s.  Kara had gold tats just like the Angel.  She was blonde, tall, broad-shouldered just like the Angel.  Maggie supposed she could think of worse things than being neighbors with a sweet, slightly goofy pagan superhero.

  
  
  
  



	11. On Jesus and the Virgin Mary

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Maggie pays a visit to the Inkin' Temple.

Astra was backwards in the padded chair, shirt off, while Alex hunched forward, carefully working on the ornate garden that she was tattooing on Astra’s back. After some consideration, Astra had decided that she wanted an explosion of rosette succulents in vibrant colors spilling across her shoulder blade and down her ribcage. She had become enamored of green, growing things, and had, in addition to the basil plants on the windowsill, a steadily growing collection of small succulents in various colors that Kara insisted on bringing her nearly every time she came over. Even when Astra had been a girl, Krypton’s environment did not allow things to simply grow, organically, with nothing but water, air, and sunlight, and as an adult on Earth, she thrilled at tending things and guiding them from seed to maturity. It seemed appropriate that her first ink would be a represent the way her love for these things spilled out of her.

Susan was listening to some Dvorak and cleaning her equipment after her last customer, and they bantered back and forth easily while Alex worked with calm focus on Astra’s muscled back. She had never thought in all her life that she would get to put her hands on such a flawless canvas.

The chimes on the front door of the shop rang, and Alex glanced up for a half moment. She saw the small woman walk in with that kind of practiced ease that you saw a lot in plainclothes cops. She was cute, though. Pretty face and walking around in what Alex saw, on second glance, was a POLICE windbreaker that was comically too large on her small frame.

“Alex Danvers?”

Alex was applying a vibrant blue to the tips of one of the rosettes on Astra’s back. “Yeah?”

The cop pushed her windbreaker open a little more to show the badge on her belt. “Detective Sawyer, NCPD. I’m friendly with your sister, Kara. We’re neighbors, actually. She said you did those nice gold tats she's got, and I was hoping I could ask you a couple of questions about them.”

Alex didn’t look up as she was applying the blue. This was delicate work. “Mm, okay. This sounds official.”

The cop nodded and moved a little closer. “It sort of is. I have a person of interest in a case of mine, and witnesses said he had shiny copper tattoos. I was hoping maybe you could tell me about the…” Detective Sawyer hesitated as Alex paused in applying the color and her fingers brushed absently down Astra’s ribcage. Alex wasn’t sure but she thought maybe she heard the cop’s breath catch. “...the work you do and if you keep a list of your clients.”

Alex looked up at her and couldn’t help smirking just a little. She reached down and brushed a little of the Astra’s hair off of her shoulder. “Just give me a minute, babe,” she muttered, and briefly kissed the place where her hand had just been.

Maybe I’m showing off, she thought. She wasn’t sorry.

“Of course,” Astra replied impassively.

Alex straightened up, set down the tattoo gun, and placed her hands on her hips, looking Detective Sawyer directly in the eye. “So, Detective, what exactly can I tell you?”

“Well, are there a lot of places that offer this type of metallic inking? Because I’ve never run into it until now, with this person of interest, and then Kara. And of course,” she added, and Alex could feel her eyes, watchful on her, “they say the Burning Angel has them. She a client of yours?”

“I’m afraid I can’t divulge that,” Alex answered with a chuckle. “It’s privileged information.”

“I wasn’t aware that tattooist/client privilege was a thing.”

Alex gave her a mysterious smile and shook her head. “Well, I’m not at liberty to talk about the Angel, but I’ll check our schedule books, and see if I can’t help you with your suspect.”

“I didn’t say suspect,” Sawyer jousted, “I said person of interest.”

Alex gave her a patented Alex Danvers ‘bitch, please’ look. “This ain’t my first rodeo.”

Detective Sawyer tilted her head and looked again at her. “You an ex-cop?”

“Close.” Alex didn’t elaborate, and for a moment they had a staredown, both smirking and waiting to see who would break first. Alex finally rolled her eyes. “I used to be DEO.”

The detective’s eyebrow shot up. “Well, then. Did you serve with Director Lane?”

Alex shrugged. “For like a minute. I was on my way out when she came in. We know her.” Alex walked over to the front desk and opened her schedule book. “So, species?”

“Human, or looks human.”

Alex nodded. “Male? Female? Other?”

“Witnesses say male. Kind of a big guy. Late twenties to mid thirties, Caucasian-ish.”

“Well, we get a lot of those,” Alex muttered, flipping through the schedule book. White dude, white dude, white dude… She hadn’t even realized how much of their clientele was white dudes until she’d looked. She was aware, peripherally, of the detective sauntering over to Astra and looking at the work she’d done so far on her back.

“That's a lot of succulents,” she commented, looking at the vibrant mosaic of aloe and echeveria rosettes sprouting across Astra’s shoulder blade. 

And Astra glanced over her shoulder and responded coolly, “I like succulents.” Alex chuckled to herself. The cop was clearly checking out not just the ink work but Astra herself, and Astra was, naturally, beautifully, blissfully unaware of this. Alex couldn’t even be mad. Her girlfriend was genetically perfect, to the point where sometimes even otherwise straight women couldn’t help admiring her.

“Well, don't we all,” the detective responded. She cleared her throat, shuffled her foot a moment, then slipped off her police windbreaker and draped it over one shoulder. “Hey, do you work at Geelax’s range? I think I’ve seen you a couple of times. You’re usually leaving when I’m on my way in.” 

“Yes,” the Astra answered, “I am the day manager three days a week.”

At this moment, Alex’s eyes lit on a name in the schedule and she had a thought. She called out, “Are you sure it was copper and not bronze? The copper isn’t as popular, but the bronze gets a lot of takers.”

Sawyer shrugged. “Do you have samples? I’ll have to show the witnesses.”

Alex sifted through a desk drawer and pulled out a proof for a brochure that had not yet gone to print; it had all the printer’s marks around the outside and bore a bunch of notes in the margins and she had circled a few things with red pen. She waved it at the detective. “Here. You can show them these. Photo samples of the bronze and copper are on the back. Just bring it back when you're done, I need those notes for the printer. Did they tell you anything about the actual art?”

Sawyer came over and took the paper, folded it carefully, and nodded as she stuffed it in her pocket. “Yeah. Soldier with a spear. Possibly fighting a snake? That ring any bells?”

Alex squinted. “Oh, yeah. I remember that. Susan and I both had to work on him. Black and bronze. The art was in a … a Greek style. Greek dragons looked like snakes, I guess. It was reproduced off a piece of art he brought in. That’s the only tat I’ve done like that.”

“You remember the guy?”

Alex nodded. “Yeah, he wasn’t too chatty. Didn’t seem to like anyone or have any sense of humor I was aware of.” She flipped through her book and called out, “Susan, you remember our Greek soldier guy? When did we work on him?”

Susan, who was the best wingman and had been listening the entire time anyway, responded as she was sanding the contact points on her machine, “Ah, I want to say it was like a month ago? It wasn’t long after we went public with the metallics.” 

“Wow, so the metallics are that new?” Sawyer interjected.

“Yeah,” Alex said, closing the drawer. “I’ve been developing them for a while, but we only started making them available maybe two months ago.”

“Does anyone else in town do them?”

“Not that I’m aware of.” Alex continued paging through the schedule book. “Oh!” she exclaimed, stopping on a page. “This was the guy…” She sighed. “I’m afraid it’s not gonna be much help to you, though, Detective. His name was John. John C.” 

Maggie frowned. “Well, it’s not nothing. I don’t suppose you got any pics of him?”

Alex shook her head.

“But you must have taken a picture of the tattoo,” Astra chimed in from her chair. “You spoke that night of how well it turned out. Surely it is in your portfolio.”

Alex clicked her tongue against the roof of her mouth and winked at her shirtless girlfriend. “You’re so smart, baby.” She hauled out a large photo album and paged through and found the photo. It was impressive. It looked like it belonged on an ancient Greek vase.

“It is your favorite thing about me,” Astra responded, and Alex recognized the lilt of teasing in her voice that it had taken Alex a little time to be able to hear.

“No,” Alex answered with a smirk, “that's your tacos.”

The detective bit down on her lip and like she was holding back about a hundred inappropriate comments. Alex chuckled to herself. Kinda thirsty, that one, she thought with some satisfaction. She didn’t get this way often but every now and then it was nice to be reminded that she’d managed to win the heart of a woman as incredible as Astra. She might have preened a little as Sawyer whipped out her phone and photographed the picture of the tat. 

“This is really helpful, thanks.” She put her phone back.

Alex smiled. “Good luck.”

“See you around,” she replied, and left. 

As Sawyer walked away, Alex noticed two things:

One, watching her walk away was a very pleasant thing. Alex didn’t consider herself much of an ass woman, but sometimes, you had to make exceptions and this was one of those cases.

Two, Sawyer still had the brochure. Technically, she didn’t really need it, since she had the photo of the actual tat. But having the brochure meant she had a reason to come back, which meant Alex would get another opportunity to watch her walk away, which was not a bad thing.

She looked up and saw Astra observing her in the mirror.

“Yeah?” she asked.

Astra’s mouth was pursed in thought. “She wanted you,” she observed without preamble.

Susan guffawed. Alex shot her a look. Astra’s unvarnished frankness was actually refreshing most of the time. Alex was able to just be honest back. “Yeah, well in case you didn’t notice, she was checking you out, too.”

Astra shrugged. “So? Would you bed her?”

Susan snorted again.

Alex turned around and glared at her. “Either participate in this conversation or shut up.”

Susan laughed and held up a conciliatory hand. “Well, if you guys don’t want any, I’ll have some,” she chuckled. “She was fine as hell.”

Alex shook her head. “You’re the fucking worst.”

“What?” Susan demanded. “You guys shouldn’t be greedy, you already have each other.”

But Astra had her teeth into this question, and wasn’t in the habit of letting go once she’d got that way. “Would you, Alex?”

Alex laughed. “Oh, you know. In the abstract, sure. Didn’t you think she was cute?”

 

Astra nodded. “She was.”

“Well, wouldn’t you want to? If you could?”

Astra thought about this. “I do not know her. I cannot answer this question.”

“OK, OK, but just … aesthetically.”

Astra shrugged. “She is pleasing to look at. If her character is not worthy, though, I would have no interest.”

Alex peered at her. “But if it was worthy, would you?”

Astra smiled at Alex. “In all my years, you are the first who was worthy of waking the passions in my body and soul. What are the odds that I would find another?”

Susan sighed a little at this. Alex had to admit it was pretty romantic, in its way.

In moments like this, Alex remembered how different a culture Astra really came from. It was strange –wonderful, yes, but strange– to be someone’s first, last, and everything. She walked over and brushed her fingers down Astra’s spine before sitting down to resume work on the garden. “Look, it’s all hypothetical, right?”

Astra smirked, tossing a little glance over her shoulder. “If it is hypothetical, why did you let her leave with the brochure?”

Alex grinned. Her woman knew her a little too well. It was nice to be known.

 

**************************

 

Maggie marched into the communal living room and stood directly in front of Kara’s view of the TV. “You little shit!” she exclaimed.

Kara looked up, confused. “What? What did I do? Didn’t she help you?”

“Yeah she did. But you didn’t tell me she was smoking hot! Warn a bitch next time, will you, Danvers?”

Kara laughed. “Sorry, Maggie. She’s my sister. I don’t think of her that way.”

“Well, you could have at least warned me about her girlfriend. She’s smoking hot, too!”

Kara chuckled some more. “I really don’t think of her that way. She’s my aunt.”

Maggie stopped cold. Kara could see the look behind her eyes, of Maggie's CPU processing information that it didn’t know what to do with. Mercifully, Kara explained, “I’m adopted. My biological aunt … was presumed dead until relatively recently.”

“Where… where was she?”

Kara sighed. How to explain? “She was sort of a… a POW.”

Maggie gave a low whistle. “Jesus. Is it weird that she’s with your adopted sister now?”

Kara nodded. “Yeah, a little. I mean, it’s the reason I took this place instead of staying with them. I’m really glad they’re happy. And they’re so, so good for each other. But… I can’t listen to them bang, you know? I’m pretty chill but I have limits.”

Maggie nodded sympathetically. “I bet.” She scratched her head. “So they’re like… pretty serious, I guess?”

Kara nodded. “Seems like.”

“Think they’d ever take a third?”

Kara stared at her blankly for a moment.

Maggie gave her a significant look.

“OH!” Kara exclaimed when she realized what Maggie meant. “I don’t know, really. Neither of them has ever had that kind of thing. I know it’s not that weird here, but they’re not… they’ve just started figuring things out.” Certain alien species, Kara knew, required three mates to reproduce instead of two, and the result was that the local culture was a little more accepting in general of three-way relationships. It wasn’t extremely common among humans, but Kara had seen a few in her short time here, so she knew it was a thing that people weren’t overly shocked about.

Maggie looked inquisitively at her.

Kara sighed. “Look, I’m not warning you off, I’m just saying … if you’re even gonna try going there, you need to know that they’ve both been through a lot. Their story isn’t really mine to tell you, that’s up to them, but … I have to know that your only intention is to bring more happiness into their relationship.”

So Maggie swore on the Bible, on Jesus and the Virgin Mary (none of which she really believed in any more but they were the best she could do) that her intentions were honest and good, if not exactly pure. “It’s been awhile since I had a good chase that didn’t start with a dead body and end with someone in handcuffs… Although the handcuffs aren’t–”

“Just don’t.”

“I mean–”

“Stop.”


	12. An Infinite Number of Mysteries

Lena headed down to the cafe across the street from L-Corp, glancing at the large, glowing digital clock projected on the large glass wall in the lobby. She was on time, but cutting it close as usual. 

Lucy didn’t want her going back to work so soon after her incident, but really, Lena was fine after a few days and couldn’t leave things sitting for longer than that. Neither L-Corp nor the Science Council’s business would wait. In particular, the Science Council’s internal politics needed to be watched carefully. Lena wasn’t about to cede an inch. Lucy wasn’t pleased but she understood and respected that.

Lucy was less than thrilled about Lena going and doing an interview so soon, too, but Lena dismissed her. “Please, I know what I’m doing with reporters, I’ve been in the public eye since I was four. Besides, this isn’t even about that, it’s about the theoretical chemistry initiative.”

So she marched across the street to the large, glass-walled cafe. It was breezy, bright and very public. She wouldn’t be seen to be cowering in a corner after the library incident, whether or not it was meant to be an attempt on her life. She was not afraid of anyone.

Besides, this reporter was a new hire at the Trib for their science column. Lena expected a comfortable conversation on safe subjects. 

She found Kara Danvers sitting at a table near the back. She was blonde, sunny, and dressed in a cute, if conservative little cardigan and button down shirt. Not likely to be shrugging that off for the noonday prayer, Lena supposed. “Miss Danvers?”

Kara stood up, took her hand firmly and shook it enthusiastically. She was quite a bit taller than Lena expected her to be, and she realized that underneath the tidy cardigan that her shoulders were actually rather broad. The softness of her face, the warmth of her smile, somehow made her height and build not the first thing Lena noticed about her. “Miss Luthor,” she answered, “please, sit.”

Lena smiled and sat down. “Aten’s blessings, wonderful to meet you.”

“Thanks for talking with me, Miss Luthor,” Kara began in a friendly, overly polite way. Something nagged at Lena. There was something familiar about her.

“Miss Danvers,” she answered, arching an eyebrow, “please, call me Lena, and if you wouldn’t mind, I’d like to call you Kara, and let’s just chat about this program, because I’m very excited about it and I think you’ll be just as excited once you see what we’re trying to do.”

Every word, every gesture was strategic. Lena was poised and knew how to deal with the press. You get them comfortable with you immediately, get on a first-name basis, make them feel like they know you, make them like you, win their trust or at least make them inclined to give you the benefit of the doubt. This, she had done. And then, she had, in the most friendly of ways, made it clear that she wasn’t there to discuss anything other than the program. 

“Well,” Kara answered enthusiastically, “it is exciting!” Her dark blue eyes sparkled like they had actual stars in them. Lena was married to a beautiful woman and wanted for nothing where that was concerned, but it was hard not to notice. “You’re talking about elevating science education at the grade school level far beyond anything seen anywhere in America, even in National City.”

Lena nodded with enthusiasm. Kara had clearly read the literature she’d sent over to the Trib. “Yes, and really, it’s unique, as far as I know, in the world. A few schools in China and Akhetaten are trying to do something similar, but not quite like we are.”

Lena went on, explaining what she intended to do with her program. It was nothing less ambitious than introducing theoretical chemistry to National City’s children at the fourth grade level. Kid’s minds, she explained, were incredibly malleable and adaptable and could absorb more than adults credited them with. “Look, a generation ago, people couldn’t believe that children were being taught the basics of gene structure in school at that level. We need to stop underestimating our kids. Children learn languages more easily than adults do, and what is science but a language?”

Kara had so many great questions. How did she plan to teach theoretical chemistry to kids who didn’t yet have a grasp of calculus? How would the necessary math skills be folded into the modules? How long would the experimental groups be run before trying to roll it out across the city? Were there plans to expand this to the state level or even nationally? And then the social side of it; there were still so many failing and struggling schools in America, wasn’t it wiser to address the inequities in the system and bring the kids at the bottom up to grade level before trying something so advanced? 

“Society needs brilliant people,” Lena answered smoothly. “Of course we need to address education as an issue nationally, but the two aren’t mutually exclusive. It’s brilliant people who move the world forward. We need to do right by the masses, surely, but it would be doing ourselves a disservice not to nurture genius, not to foster the next generation of Teslas and Einsteins.”

“Forgive me if this is an ignorant question,” Kara said, then, “I haven’t been here in town for very long, but that sounds very consistent with an Atenist worldview. Would you say that your approach to this is reflective of your faith?”

Lena paused uneasily. It was always odd having her attention called to her religion. She had converted to Atenism, but she had been in the faith a long time, and living in National City, she was so steeped in it that she simply took it for granted. She thought for a moment, and then nodded. “That’s a very good question, and I can’t deny that my beliefs shape me in ways that I’m not even conscious of. But it’s not a conversion scheme, if that’s what you’re asking.”

Kara laughed then, in such a guileless and easy manner that Lena instantly relaxed. “Oh, no, I’m not suggesting that at all! I just meant … well, I haven’t known many Atenists but it seemed consistent with what I knew of the faith, and what I’ve learned since moving here. So, I was curious as to whether you would consider this program a natural outgrowth of your spiritual beliefs.”

Lena grinned at her. “That’s a very ballsy question.”

Kara shrugged cheerfully. “Nah, I just don’t know any better than to ask whatever’s on my mind.”

Lena appreciated her honesty. “I see. Well, yes. My faith values the tangible, the rational, the measurable. That’s not so for most other faiths. I like to think we’re unique in that way.”

Kara nodded then. “I was raised in a very similar faith, actually, so I appreciate that about Atenism. And honestly…” She took a rather loud drink of the dregs of her smoothie and gestured around. “...it’s really hard to argue with the results.”

“Is that so?” Lena inquired, suddenly intrigued.

Kara nodded. “Mm-hmm. I mean, I don’t understand these faiths that rely on mysteries. What kind of god doesn’t want their children illuminated? In an infinite universe, there’s an infinite number of mysteries, so why not support the idea of understanding them and getting that much closer to comprehending the order of it all?”

Lena felt a shiver run down her back at this because she hadn’t heard it articulated quite that way before but it was very much of a piece with what she believed. She hadn’t expect this girl who looked like she belonged on a surfboard to come in with so much spiritual and intellectual heft. “What faith was that, if you don’t mind my asking?”

Kara smiled. “My god’s a sun god too, actually. It’s called Rao, and it’s very far from here.”

Lena nodded slowly. “Is that right?”

Kara nodded.

“So... where are you from exactly?”

Kara shook her head, grinning. “Now, Miss Luthor–”

“Lena,” Lena corrected.

“Lena… I thought I was interviewing you.”

Lena shrugged. “I’m afraid you’ve made me a little curious.”

Well, it all went off the rails after that. Kara would only say that she’d moved to National City from Illinois. She learned about Kara’s double masters in Creative Writing and Quantum Particle Physics, and then next thing, they were discussing was the flaws in string theory and chuckling over questions about whether the Large Hadron Collider had in fact destroyed the universe and they were living in an alternate reality. What was supposed to be a half-hour interview turned into ninety minutes. Lena found something so familiar about her, but couldn’t put her finger on it, and it wasn’t that she had met someone like her at some point because she was pretty sure she’d never met anyone quite like her. Kara Danvers was intelligent, could hang on her level with math and physics, clearly had a heart the size of Texas, and underneath that, Lena could sense that there was still some steel. 

Reluctantly, Lena glanced at her phone. She’d already sent several texts to Jess, asking her to push back this or that, but there was an L Corp board meeting looming and she couldn’t very well move that or show up late. “Kara, I’m afraid that we’ve spent much more time chatting than I had really budgeted for, and–”

“Oh, gosh, I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean to keep you!”

Lena stood, beaming at her. “Absolutely not, I refuse to hear apologies. I chose to spend my time talking with you and I’m utterly thrilled to have done so.” Kara stood, and this time, Lena was less surprised this time by her height and the strength of her grip as they shook hands. 

She left feeling warm from head to heel, feeling a way she hadn’t felt since the day she realized she was falling for Lucy Lane. Oh boy, she thought, I’m in trouble.

 

***************

 

Kara called her twice that week to verify information for her article. The first time led to Lena asking Jess to hold her calls for what ended up being an hour while they talked first about the program and then about the experience of growing up a genius in an environment that didn’t understand genius. The second time, she was trying to remember the name of a chemist that they’d discussed, and they ended up talking for forty-five minutes about how Michio Kaku was the world’s greatest bullshit artist and then arguing about whether his theoretical lightsaber could actually be made or not, and then discussing which color light saber they’d each wield (Kara felt she was a blue, and Lena, they agreed, was probably a purple).

She read Kara’s column and it was thoughtful and positive. Her writing style didn’t bubble over the way her personality did, but it was immensely friendly and accessible, and Lena made sure to send an email thanking her for the great write-up.

The following week she encountered Kara twice more, seemingly by accident on the street. The first time was in the park across from the Science Council building, when she had just slipped her blouse back up over her shoulders after noontime devotionals. The sun was still warm on her skin and she smiled, thanking the Aten for its light. And then she looked up, and saw on the other side of the park, none other than Kara Danvers, climbing down from a tree in which, apparently, a child’s balloon had been caught. She shook her head in amazement and began making her way over. By the time she’d reached the other side of the park, Kara Danvers had helped an elderly woman with a walker up onto the curb and then, while waiting in line for the taco truck, appeared to have given some change to the young guy in front of her who didn’t have quite enough for his order.

“Kara Danvers,” she called out, drawing nearer. “Did you even see me on the other side of the park?”

Kara pushed her glasses up her nose and grinned. “Nope. Hi, Lena!”

Lena smiled back and sauntered nearer. “Look at you, you girl scout, helping people.” She watched with mild surprise as Kara took a large bag that looked like it had about five orders of tacos in it. “Getting lunch for the office?”

Kara shrugged. “Nah, just hungry.”

At this moment, an elderly gentleman passed by and patted Kara on the arm, muttering to her, “Aten bless you,” as he passed.

“Don’t even mention it!” she called after him.

“I will mention it if I feel like it young lady!” he snapped. “You saved my dog!”

Kara turned back to Lena. “He’s a grumpy one, but he’s got a real soft heart.”

Lena gazed at his back as he hobbled away. “You saved his dog?”

Kara shrugged. “Oh, he’s being so dramatic about it. His little guy had gotten off his leash and almost ran in front of a car. I happened to be there so I grabbed him.”

“Well,” Lena remarked, impressed, “you’re a regular Burning Angel, aren’t you?”

Kara laughed, and it was the sunniest sound Lena had heard in a long time. She jokingly primped her hair. “Do you think so?”

Lena peered at her. “I don’t know,” she said, half-seriously, “but you are something else.”

The second time was just after sundown, by the NCSC library, which was still cordoned off. She wasn’t sure why she’d swung by there, maybe just to rehash the details of the whole thing. Kara was there, gazing through the blown-out windows. She apparently was thinking about doing a short column on what was lost and what was saved, or so she said.

“I was the Angel’s first rescue, you know,” Lena said.

“First public one anyway,” Kara pointed out.

Lena smiled. “True enough.”

“Was it interesting?”

“I don’t know if that’s the word I’d use. My memory is not so good. But I wish I could thank her in person.” 

Kara just smiled at her pointed look.

Kara was a little spark of something, a thread of something golden, and Lena was struggling to keep her thoughts off of it. She hadn’t mentioned any of these encounters to Lucy apart from the initial interview, and she was struggling a bit with that. 

Lena nearly took leave of her good senses the next time Kara called. Kara barely had a reason to call other than that she badly wanted a recommendation for good Chinese food, potstickers in particular, and Lena, she said, was her only friend in town.

“We’re friends?” Lena teased.

“Absolutely. You’ve sat through my story about my eighth grade science fair. That makes us friends.”

“Are you sure your journalistic objectivity isn’t compromised by talking to me so much?”

“Meh,” Kara answered, and then laughed. 

Ugh, Lena groaned internally, that laugh. They talked for another half hour, about what flavor of quark they’d be if they were each quarks (Lena was a strange and Kara was a charm), and whether President Marsdin was serious about science education in underserved communities, and then they argued over which of them loved Chinese food more. 

Lena ended up offering to take Kara for lunch at a dumpling shop located in National City’s sizeable Chinatown. It was more of the same. She didn’t mention it to Lucy. And it was too comfortable, too easy, too good. They resonated off of each other, vibrating like strings against each other’s quantum gravity. Lena knew she’d better go above board with all of this, or she’d be irreversibly fucked.

“You know,” she said over a plate of crystal shrimp dumplings, “you should come over for dinner one night soon. You really have to meet my wife, I think you two would love each other.”

There, she thought with relief, it was out. It was spoken. She had been telling herself she was just being discreet, which was her normal modus operandi, but she had to make it clear where things stood. She couldn’t lead Kara on, and she couldn’t get caught up in anything either.

If Kara was disappointed, she didn’t show it much. “I’d love to meet her!” she enthused, shoveling down more dumplings than any girl ought to be able to. 

So the plan was made. Bringing Kara into her home and introducing her to Lucy would quell this bubbling-up of… of whatever it was.

She hoped.


	13. The Simple Pleasures

Peacetimes made Astra uneasy when they lasted for too long.

Not that she didn’t like Earth, and National City.  She liked its rock and roll,  its jazz, its cinemas full of stories.  She liked its history, and the Romans in particular had captured her interest; she studied volume after volume of their tactics and the accounts of their wars and conquests.  She was enraptured by sushi and EDM and Christmas and Diwali and Jackson Pollock and bowling and donuts.  It was not a bad world, though very different from Krypton, and she devoured it with fierce curiosity and relished its differentness.

And of course, she was living with Alex, and loved her in the kind of heart-full, skin-aflame kind of way that she had never imagined was possible for her.  She had found employ not as a soldier, but in things that were… well, soldier-adjacent, she supposed, that were comfortable, and that she excelled at.  Her niece had been returned to her, the last and most precious of her lost line.  She had a family now, a home, and a life that she had carved from nothing, on a new world.  She had a growing collection of green plants, as Kara kept bringing more to populate the windowsill beside her basil plants; succulents, herbs, flowers.  Like Alex, Astra was weary of battle, but it was so baked into her being that it was hard for her to not be leading an army.  Just living quietly was difficult.  But she had found ways to get around that, choosing to remain prepared for the eventual battles to come.

She didn’t know what they’d be, she only knew readiness had never been a bad choice.

Astra loved her niece desperately, so she was pleased to see her succeeding in this different place.  Her writing was well received by those who needed to like it, she seemed to like the woman who employed her, and her heroics were… well, Astra was happy to see her doing good in the world, and seeing her fulfilled by it.  She was pleased to see that the city, and the alien community in particular, embraced her, yet also, for the time being at least, respected her privacy.  She’d smile often at the latest glimpse of her Kara on the television screens in a shop window, golden tattoos flashing in the sun as she rescued a puppy or did something that involved her setting yet another of her tidy little outfits on fire.  It did make her nervous though; Kal-El had brought calamity on himself by coming out as a hero, and was constantly having to defend his city from problems that would have never befallen it were it not for him.

And there were other things that made her nervous.

Kara came sailing in one evening as Astra was cooking up what could only be described as a vat of chicken korma, with the smell of coconut-sprinkled peshwari naan wafting from the oven.  “Smells amazing!” she sighed as she floated over to the windowsill, placed a potted petunia on the table below the windowsill, which was quickly becoming overrun with her frequent gifts.  She then floated over to Astra, twirling once in the air on her way over, and flung her arms around her waist and squeezed as she stirred the chicken.  “What is it?”

“Indian food,” Astra answered.  “Do you know about Indian food?”

“Not much, but I’m willing to learn…. Do I smell coconut?”

“Yes.”  Astra covered the pot and faced her niece, who was unusually cheerful even for her.  “Why are you so light on your feet?”

Kara was beaming.  “I might have had lunch with Lena Luthor.  She always puts me in a good mood.”

Astra frowned.  “You should be careful with her.”

“Oh, don’t worry, she’s nothing like her brother.”

Astra shook her head.  “It is not her brother that concerns me.”

“You mean her mother, then?”  

Astra squeezed Kara’s shoulder once.  “Partly, yes.  She is as dangerous as her son, but she walks free.  And… and that is partially my fault.”

Kara’s brow furrowed. “How is it your fault?”

Astra was quiet for a few minutes as she spooned some rice and some Korma onto two plates along with a piece of naan for each of them.  They sat on stools at the counter and ate.

“Without Myriad, she would not have had a justification for her attempted genocide, nor for her public activities now.”

Kara shook her head as if to clear it.  “Wait, attempted genocide?”

Astra sighed.  There was still so much to explain.  “She launched rockets from the piers, aimed at killing all of the aliens in National City.  The rockets were armed with a pathogen she stole… from  _ my _ blood.”

“How did she get your blood?”

Astra sighed.  “It only makes sense that she had someone steal samples from within the DEO.”

Kara, who had been literally walking on air a moment ago, was now deflated.  “How was she stopped?”

“Her daughter –your … friend– sabotaged her plan.”

“So then Lena’s one of the good guys!”

“But Little One, I also… counsel you to have a care for your heart.  I have seen your face when you talk about Lena Luthor.  Do not give yourself to her too freely.”

Kara pouted a little.  “Did you give yourself too freely to Alex when you realized how you felt?”

Astra chuckled.  Never one to let go of a thing once she'd set her mind to it, her Kara. It was a family trait.  

Astra and Alex had, after her release from the DEO, taken to holding each other for comfort during their respective bouts of nightmares and panic.  Astra remembered clearly the moment she had decided that she desired such closeness even when she was not in crisis, the moment she became aware that it felt as if every cell in her body craved Alexandra Danvers.  She remembered their first kiss, tender and laced with equal measures desire and fear, until Alex returned it, and they came undone for each other instantly, as if it was what they had both needed their entire lives without even knowing it.  “I did. I would think that if life has taught you anything it is that I am probably not the best example.”

Kara squared her shoulders and set her chin.  “I couldn't be  prouder to call you my family.”

Whether she meant it or not, it didn't matter.  Astra felt warm tears well up for a moment behind her eyes, so she closed them.  She felt Kara’s warm hand over hers.

“I mean it.  You are the great General Astra, scourge of the Daxamites and conqueror of the Greeks.”  She winked.  “And more important than that, you make my sister happier than I've ever seen her.”

Kara was a good soul.  This world had not done so badly by her.

Eager to change the subject to something more cheery, Kara shifted gears.  “Anyway, Lena’s just a little crush.  I mean, she's married.  So what do you think of Maggie?”

Astra blinked.  “Who?”  

“My friend.  She came by the shop looking for help with a case, she said she met you.”

Recognition dawned in Astra's mind.  “Ah yes,” she replied vaguely.  “The detective.”  She tilted her head and gazed at Kara for a moment, curious.  “Why?”

Kara smiled and shrugged.  “She liked you guys.”

Astra considered this for a moment. “We barely met.  Your sister seemed to enjoy her presence.  In particular she seemed to enjoy watching her walk away.”

Kara almost snorted korma out her nose.  

Just then, the apartment door scraped open and Alex came sauntering in.  “Don't tell me you didn't!” she exclaimed.

Astra shrugged.  “As I said before, Alex, she is pleasing to look at, but what does it matter?”  

Alex laughed.  “It's just fun, that's all!  C’mon, she was cute and  _ sassy _ !”  She bit down on the word  _ sassy _ as if she liked the taste of it. She came over and kissed Astra’s cheek from behind before turning around to help herself to the contents of the pot.  “It's alright to like looking at sexy people.”

Astra smiled faintly.  “I like looking at you,” she answered.  But her curiosity was piqued.  And there were still so many human experiences to have.

  
  
  


************

  
  


Astra looked around the room.  Hands on her hips, posture perfect, her eyes inspecting each face, each body in it’s loose-fitting training clothing, looking for fear in their eyes or laziness or weakness in their bearing.  “I see a few new faces.”  

Her eyes lit for a moment on the face of the detective, the pretty one who had been by the tattoo shop that day.  She smiled inwardly.  Alex would be envious to know that she had come here.  But outwardly, she was stern, as ever.  “For those who are new, welcome to Y’on-Alsha’an.”  Her voice rang in the open gymnasium.  “If you are here to learn Kryptonian martial arts, you are in the right place.  If you are here to learn to fight like Superman, you should leave, because the Center does not currently offer a class called Punch and Pray.”

A nervous little chuckle rippled through the room.  Her older students had heard this speech many times.  The new ones were, correctly, intimidated by her and weren’t sure if they were supposed to laugh or not.

“Superman,” she went on, allowing the air quotes to imply themselves in her tone of voice, “relies upon his strength, his speed.  His freezing breath, his heat vision.  In short, he relies on his powers.  But without them, he would be as vulnerable as any of you.  Any one of the better students in this room could bring him down easily.”

There was a stunned silence among the few new people in the room.  That was what Astra wanted.  To shock their perspectives, to make them understand that they were learning an art form that had been passed down for generations.  And, maybe, to also throw a bit of disdain towards her distant nephew, with whom she was less than impressed.  

The detective was watching her with curiosity, even amusement.  

“Also, do not assume that because you have studied other forms, that this course of study will have nothing to teach you. For example,”  Astra went on, “Detective, as a law officer, you must have some training?”

The detective smiled, nodding.  “Yeah, they make us all learn Krav Maga.”

Astra nodded in response.  She was familiar with that form.  Antiope had someone who taught it at the Center.  “Will you come demonstrate for us, please?”

The detective hesitated a moment, then smiled brightly, looking her right in the eye, and strode up to the front.  Astra appreciated her desire to project confidence.  But she would break her soon enough.  She pointed to a spot on the floor.  “Stand here, please.”

The detective took her place.  Astra came behind her and grabbed her in a very specific hold, one arm around her waist and her leg preventing the detective from putting both feet on the floor to gain traction against the mat.  Her other hand had the detective’s wrist and was pinching a set of nerves in it which made movement on that side of her body more difficult to achieve.  “Break my hold,” she commanded. 

The detective struggled valiantly, but she could not.  Astra tightened her hold.  She observed that the detective smelled like things that she liked; like leather, and popcorn, and the scent of green, growing things.  “As you can see,” she said to the class, as she stood holding the detective without effort, “the detective cannot break my hold, despite having trained in a similar style.  This is because Y’on-Alsha’an relies also on the disruption of your opponent’s neural functions through use of pressure similar to your practice of accupressure.”  To demonstrate, she released the detective’s wrist, and said, “Now try.”  

The detective still struggled.  Astra, after a moment of enjoying her struggles, eased off her strength and allowed the detective to break out of her hold.  “So, you have much to learn.”

The detective fell back into the ranks, rubbing her shoulder and looking like she was trying not to seem too pained.

This treatment, eight times out of ten, meant that the prospective pupil would not return to her class.  Astra was fine with this.  If a student was weak, she could make them strong, but if they were afraid of a little pain, well.  There was nothing she could do for that and she preferred not to waste her time with them.

So she was pleased to see that the detective, Maggie Sawyer, continued to return to the class.  If Astra singled her out for frequent, mildly bruising demonstrations more than her other students, she didn’t notice it.  But it did not escape her notice that despite how rough things might get, she continued to return to class, smiling gamely, and bounding up to the mat when she was called forward, no matter how many times Astra made things difficult for her.

She noticed the detective befriending her favorite, James Olson.

She noticed the detective’s smile was, as Alex has pointed out, most winning.  And that she had, perhaps, underrated the simple pleasures of watching her walk away.

This, of course, was not the place for that.

But this was not the only place.

  
  
  


**************************

 

Maggie had been coming to the Center for thrice-weekly ass-kickings for two weeks now.  “Man,” she groaned to Kara, as she held ice against a bruise on her shoulder, “I’m beginning to think this is a bad idea.  She doesn’t do small talk after class.  She just keeps kicking the shit out of me.”

“Oh, no!” Kara exclaimed.  “That’s good!”

Maggie looked up from the bowl of sesame-seed-and-panko-flakes popcorn.  “Are you for real, Danvers?”

“Yeah yeah, I promise.  She wouldn’t bother kicking your ass if she didn’t like you.  She’s testing you.”

Maggie groaned again.  “I wouldn’t mind if getting tested didn’t feel like getting hit by a bus every time.  She’s so strong.”  She glared pointedly at Kara at this.  “REAL strong.”

Kara jumped up and disappeared.  “Here,” she said, re-entering the room with a small aloe plant in a little pot.  “Bring her this.”

Maggie gave her a skeptical look.  “A potted plant?”

“It’s fucking romantic, alright?”

“It is?”

“Where I come from, it is.”

“Yeah, and where is that exactly?”

Kara sighed.  “Look, that’s not the point, but we had kind of a natural disaster, OK.  So giving her something green and alive and growing is totally romantic.  Just trust me.  Just do it.”

Maggie grumbled under her breath.  But she took the plant.

After the next practice, she took the aloe plant, and presented it to Astra.  “I remembered you had all those nice succulents tattooed all over your back, so I thought you might like one of these little guys.”

Astra took the plant from her with a faint half-smile.  “Thank you, Detective.”

“Please, for God’s sake, call me Maggie.  You’ve kicked my ass enough times at this point.”

Astra smiled.  “So I have.”  She looked down at Maggie’s shoulder, where a small bruise was showing on her shoulder, rapidly purpling.  She plucked the end of a leaf off.  “Hold still,” she commanded.  She pinched the leaf and let a bit of the juice drop out of the plump leaf and onto Maggie’s bruise.  She rubbed it in with her fingertips.  Maggie obediently held still while Astra did this.  “This will make that mark feel better.”

Maggie grinned at her.  Maybe Kara was right after all.  She shared her results with Kara, who was pleased, and insisted that her advice had been correct.  

She paid a visit to Alex at the tattoo shop, bearing the brochure.

“Thanks for loaning it to me,” she said, leaning against the front desk.

Alex smiled.  “I was looking for it the other day.  Too bad I didn’t have your number.”

Maggie reached into her pocket and dropped her card on the counter.  “Well, now you do.”

Alex chuckled a little.  “Yeah, I have a girlfriend, you know.”

Maggie nodded.  “Yeah, I know.  I’m taking her class at the Center.”

Alex grinned.  “She told me.  She said she’s been beating your ass and you’ve been coming back for more.”

Maggie laughed.  “Well, that’s about the size of it.”

“You into that sort of thing, Detective Sawyer?”

Maggie shrugged.  “First time for everything.  Anyway, thanks for your help.”  She glanced over her shoulder at the door.  “I’ll see you around, Danvers.”

“You know,” Alex called after her as she walked toward the door, “there’s an event at the Center this weekend.  You should come check it out.”  Maggie looked back at Alex, whose eyes danced in a way that made Maggie’s heartbeat stumble a little.

She tried to act nonchalant.  “OK, I’ll see if I’m around.”

Of course she was around.  Where else would she be but around? ****


	14. INTERLUDE

The Romans outnumbered the Greeks two to one.  It was supposed to be a straightforward victory.

However, the Romans were dismayed to find that the scrappy Greek cavalry had attacked them in the night whilst they lay unprepared and unawares, and the resulting damage had left the Roman army disoriented and back upon its heels, whilst the Greeks were emboldened and filled with vigor.

The Roman general, weighing the options now in the harsh light of day, surveyed the field of battle and saw that the Greek cavalry appeared to be dispersing.  Good.  If it was a battle between their infantries, then Rome would be victorious.  So the Roman general instructed her Tribune to choose a select infantry to go forward and penetrate the Greek infantry where it lay in wait, preparing to march forward.  

It would be a bloodbath.  Humans and their bloodbaths.

The Greek army seemed, however, in remarkably good spirits for a group of soldiers who were about to die.  They beat their swords upon their shields, they sang fight songs, they shouted taunts at the Roman infantry as it prepared to march forward.  The Greek army took far too much delight in what ought to be its end.  But the Roman general instructed that the trumpets be blown, that the standard be raised, and that the select infantry march forward and begin its attack upon the Greeks.  It appeared that the light, mobile Greek cavalry had dispersed into the Greek ranks.  Good, thought the Roman general.  All the targets in one place.  And plenty of Roman troops in reserve in case things should go awry.  

The Roman general’s standard was a star, golden and bright, held aloft on its pole by a small, but stout-hearted standard bearer.  It gleamed in the late-morning sun.  The Roman general’s armor gleamed too, striking a fine and noble figure atop the wall.  And the trumpets blared.

The Roman general watched the ranks with their rows of scuta raised, led by the shield wall, begin their press forward.  They marched in formation as one, with the favorite warrior at the point of the shield wall, where he belonged.  He was brave and fierce, intelligent and cunning, and had fought in many shield walls for this general before.  He was the point of the spear.  They would march to victory.

The Greek shield wall was only a few lines deep, compared with the massive Roman shield wall.  With the combined force of their lines, the Roman ranks would make short work of them.  Or so the General thought.

Until the Greek cavalry reappeared.  

They had fallen into formation at the back of the infantry, and the Roman general had not seen them until it was too late.  Rome’s cavalry had folded back into the spare infantry, and so, being far less mobile, the Roman infantry, as it marched upon the Greek, felt the impact of the Greek cavalry’s blades and arrows as it sideswiped the Roman ranks and rained fury upon the soldiers who were trapped in a boxed formation and could not easily disperse.

The Roman general cursed under her breath.

This was not how this was supposed to go.

She shouted to her tribune to scramble cavalry from the remaining troops that had not been folded into the select infantry.  The tribune scrambled down the parapets and ran through the mud, rousing the cavalry from within the infantry, to go and deal with the smaller, but more nimble and apparently more deadly Greek cavalry.

The General winced as a Greek cavalryman nearly brought her tribune down, but the tribune was good with a blade and survived the onslaught, knocking the cavalryman into the mud.

Why was there so much mud?

The battlefield was rapidly becoming a mess as the tribune continued to slash through the onslaughts of cavalry to scramble mobile response from the Roman troops, and many soldiers fell into the mud and did not rise.  But the tribune was a good fighter, quick witted and skilled, and managed to remain standing.  Greek armor was lighter, but they were more nimble, and it was proving to be the Romans’ undoing.

The General cursed under breath.  The front two lines of her shield wall were holding, at least, and continuing to clash with the Greek infantry.  Both sides struggled and slipped in the mud.  There was too much mud.  Why was there so much mud?  It had not rained the night before.  The mud worked against the Romans and their heavier bronze armor, and in favor of the Greeks, who preferred lighter leather armor.  Her favorite warrior, at least, the point of her shield wall, was still standing, still leading on the ground.  He could be trusted that way.

As her tribune led the scrambled Roman cavalry into action, the standard bearer cried out, “General!  The Greek General comes this way!”

The Roman general unsheathed her sword and leapt down from the wall, charging forward to meet the mighty, broad-shouldered Greek.  “Your decision to confront me here is folly!” she shouted.  “This is not how the battle was supposed to go!”

The Greek general was laughing, though.  She was well acquainted with battle.  She had been in countless battles, even before her many meetings with this particular Roman general.  She took great joy in it.  “You are angry that my cavalry did not disperse?”  And she leapt forward, steel flashing in the sun.

“The Greek cavalry was supposed to disperse!”  The Roman general growled, and parried the Greek’s blow with the flat of her blade.

“If my grandmother had been at Corinth that day, the Greek cavalry would have done exactly as I have had them do today!”  And so they engaged on the muddy battlefield.

The Roman paused for a moment, trying to determine what exactly the Greek general meant by this, but she did not pause for too long, and continued with the flurry of blows, blade against blade.  The Greek general leapt far higher than she should have been able to, back-flipped, and landed atop the wall.

“That is how we play today?” the Roman cried, and she leapt atop the wall and continued her advance.  “Your cavalry was supposed to disperse and your infantry was to await mine!  You have broken the rules of this engagement!”

At this moment, the general’s standard-bearer called out, “Actually, if this were strictly a re-enactment of the Battle of Corinth, that would be true, but since this is a tactical simulation, opposing generals do have latitude to change the tactics employed in the original battle in order to test whether the original tactics would have been more effective with some small alterations!”

The Roman general glared at her standard bearer as she continued her aggressive beat against the Greek.  “This is not a small alteration! The entire battle hinged upon the Greeks’ decision to disperse the cavalry!”

“Well, then,” the Greek general replied, still laughing and meeting the Roman’s steel with her own, “we are finding out how things would have gone if they had not!”

The Roman general glanced over her shoulder.  Her tribune had roused a Roman cavalry and was beating back the chaos that Greeks had brought in, their steel ringing in the noisy air.  She planted a kick to the Greek’s chest that sent her hurtling backwards.  “My tribune is beating back your cavalry.”

The Greek flipped backwards and landed on her feet upon the wall, nimble as a cat.  

“And my infantry still makes headway against yours.”

The Greek was grinning.

“And that is why you are here,” the Roman realized.  She understood that if the Greek took her out of play, that the battle would go the the Greeks.

“That’s right!!”

“Antiope, that is not the simulation we were running!”  Astra furrowed her brow as she prepared for another clash with the Greek.  “Also, it did not rain last night, why is the field so muddy?”

Antiope gestured to her mostly-female cohort, who were quite muddy at this point, and then at the largeish audience ringed along the outer wall of the large courtyard.  “I had the girls water it down last night.  We get more spectators that way.”

Astra growled.  “You play a dirty game.”  And she charged forward again.


	15. General Disarray

Maggie stood among the spectators on the outer wall.  She recognized a few people on the pitch from Astra’s class.  In particular, the guy leading the shield wall was familiar; that handsome, dreadlocked black dude.  She’d chatted him up a little in class, since Astra seemed to favor him, and found him warm, kind, and funny.  He was also an incredibly skilled fighter.  His name was James, and he was a Moon Child, a stripe of Atenist possessed of the belief that it was their job to bring the Aten’s light into dark places.  You tended to find a lot of Moon Children in gritty jobs like working with the homeless, or with drug addicts.  In James’s case, he talked a little about his photojournalism work focused on poverty in America. 

But she didn’t recognize a large number of the increasingly muddy women.  The appeal of muscular, mud-covered women kicking each other’s asses notwithstanding, she couldn’t help noticing that there was an awful lot of skill on that battlefield.

“Fancy meeting you here,” came a voice from behind her.  

She turned, and found herself face to face with Lucy Lane.  “Director?  Early on a Saturday, no?”

Lucy shrugged.  “I’m always up with the sun.”  She smiled a little.  “Aten’s blessings.”  She looked at the field.  “Roman uniforms?  Really?”  Her expression turned suddenly sour.

Maggie frowned, a little confused.  Then she remembered; Atenism’s roots were in Egypt, and the Roman Empire didn’t get on terribly well with Egypt.  It was likely considered poor taste to dress in Roman garb if you were an Atenist.  “It’s some kind of ancient history LARP-y, re-enactor thing.  Someone’s gotta be the bad guys, right?”  She winked.

Lucy sighed and shrugged.  “I guess.”  She watched for a few moments, and it was clear that on observing, she had at least some of the same thoughts Maggie did.  “So … this is a militia in training, right?”

Maggie snorted.  “Oh, yeah.  Totally.”  She looked at Lucy’s face for a moment.  “You gonna do anything about it?”

Lucy watched for a few moments more, then shook her head.  “Nah.  I may need them at some point.”

Maggie couldn’t tell if it was a joke, but it was ballsy thing to say either way.  She never could quite get a bead on Lucy’s humor.  

Then Lucy added, “What about you?  You gonna do anything?”

Maggie chuckled.  She was watching Astra in a one-on-one sword fight with the Greek general, who she was pretty sure was also the owner of the Combat Center.  “Me?  Nah.  Can’t prove anything.  Besides, to tell you the truth, I’ve kinda got my eye on the Roman general.”

Lucy Lane smirked and gestured out to where Alex Danvers was leading a makeshift cavalry to stem the damage done by the Greeks.  “Well, the General and her tribune are sort of a thing.”

Maggie nodded, and paused for a moment to thrill at Alex leaping over a wall, into the middle of some very fast-moving, heavily-armed Greeks, and engaging them without waiting for her men to follow.  They did anyway.  “Yeah, I know.  I kinda have my eye on her, too.”

Lucy Lane paused at this.  Maggie could feel the gears processing in her head before Lane’s skeptical, “Mm.  You ever done that before?”

Maggie was cheerful.  Alex and Astra weren’t exactly saying yes, but they weren’t really saying no, either.  “Nah.  But I sure wouldn’t cry if they asked me.”  She hesitated, then decided she was feeling mouthy this morning.  “What about you?”

She’d never asked Lucy Lane a personal question since the one time she’d made the mistake of asking about her old man.  But Lucy considered her for a moment and then said, “Yeah, once.”

That was about the last thing Maggie would have expected.  She knew of course that Atenists tended to be a little more laid-back about things like polyamory, but Lucy seemed particularly straight-laced.  “How was it?”  She was genuinely curious, now.

Lucy sighed.  “Well, in my case it was with the wrong people, for the wrong reasons.  I’ve seen it work, but it wasn’t the right situation.”

“I see.”  Maggie was impressed.  She didn’t push for more information than that.  She decided to move the conversation to something that would be less uncomfortable for Lucy.  “So what are you doing here on this fine morning, Director?”

“Actually, I’m here to talk to the object of your desire.”

“Which one?”

Lucy snorted.  “The General.  I want to ask her something.”

“What about?”

And then just like that, Lucy Lane clammed up again.  “DEO stuff.”

Maggie scoffed.  “Fine, be that way.”

They stood in one of their usual stilted silences while they watched the battle unfolding below.  Alex was making headway against the Greek cavalry now, backing them down the field toward where the infantries were engaging.

Then Lucy asked, “Got anything on the Burning Angel?”

Maggie wanted to laugh.  She was ninety nine percent sure it was Kara.  “Maybe, why?”

“I want to talk to her about the library fire.”

Maggie frowned.  “Why?  That’s not your jurisdiction.”

Lucy turned to her.  “Are you working it?”

Maggie nodded.  “Yeah.”

“Isn’t it not really your jurisdiction, either?”

Maggie shrugged.  “Maybe, maybe not.  It got dropped in my lap, though, by the powers that be.”

“Got anything on it?”

Maggie shook her head.  “Lane, you can’t shake me down for information unless you tell me why.  Maybe I can help, maybe I can’t.”

Lane was clearly uncomfortable and then she stepped closer to Maggie and said, “Look, it’s personal.”  Maggie saw the intensity in her mien increase as she dwelled for a moment on whether or not to share what she was considering sharing.  

“Personal how?”

“I need your word that you’ll be discreet about this.”

“Of course.”

Lucy seemed to complete her internal calculus, then.  She leaned forward, and in a very quiet voice, she said, “Personal as in, Lena Luthor is my partner.”

Maggie paused.  “Your partner, as in your... partner-partner?”

“We’ve been married for two years.”

“....Okay,” Maggie managed, after a moment of awkward silence in which more steel clanged in the background and more trumpets blared.  She had a million questions.   _ How’d you meet her?  Why the secrecy?   _ Instead, she went with, “In that case, I can tell you that we’re looking into whether the library’s fire prevention systems were tampered with, and I’m having the hospital run a limited toxicology to check your wife’s blood sample for fentanyl.”

Lucy furrowed her brow.  “Why fentanyl?”

“Well, I don’t know if you saw the labs I sent over on the drycleaner’s case, but they gassed him with fentanyl, just like I thought.  Second time we’ve seen that in relatively close succession.  Everyone I talked to seemed to find it very unlike your wife to fall asleep on the job no matter how sleep deprived she might be, so I thought gas, maybe.  And since the effects were consistent with carefully-deployed fentanyl…”

“You told them to test for it, which they wouldn’t have done initially on a case that just came in for smoke inhalation.”

Maggie nodded.  Lucy Lane was smart enough that she didn’t have to spell everything out all the time, and Maggie really appreciated that.

“You think the library is related to the shopkeep cases?”

Maggie shook her head.  “I don’t know.  Who would have a motive to go after your wife?”

Lucy sighed.  “I suppose it can’t be ruled out that her mother is a possibility.  She may not even have intended to kill her, it may have just been a warning, a way of getting at me.”

“Her mom not a fan a fan of yours?”

“Her mom is Lillian Luthor and I’m the director of the DEO, what do you think?”

Maggie chuckled.  “Yeah, I guess not.”

“Plus, she’s a little homophobic.”

“Color me shocked.”

“I know.”

Another one of their long silences followed, in which the Roman infantry was finally overwhelming the Greek, and the battle between Antiope and Astra was reaching a rather intense pitch, the two of them pushing back and forth along the higher of the two constructed walls on the battlefield.  

“Get it, girl!” Maggie yelled impulsively.  Astra glanced up, and seemed to flash a very faint smile (it was hard to see at this distance), and then redoubled her efforts against the Greek general.  She knocked her off the wall, which should have ended it, but the Greek flipped back on her way down and, amazingly, landed on her feet.  Maggie hooted out loud and cursed, and then Astra followed, landing catlike in front of the General and, snatching a Greek roundshield from the mud, she charged at the Greek and laid into her until the Greek slipped in the mud and was forced to one knee.

They remained locked for a moment more, and then Astra pointed her sword down and the Greek yielded.  A little cheer went up among the spectators, and Maggie was the loudest.

“Wow, are you ever thirsty,” Lucy scolded.

Maggie just laughed.  “Not all of us are married to Lena Luthor.”

Lucy flushed a little.  

“Oh,” Maggie said, reaching into her pocket for her phone.  She flipped through her photographs till she found the photo she took of the Greek tattoo she’d snapped at Alex’s tattoo shop.  “Apparently our man in the drycleaner case has a tat that looks like this.  Alex Danvers did the tat, she remembered him a little.”

Of course she did.  Lucy felt like kicking herself.  “Email that to me?”

“Yeah, sure.”  Maggie took a moment and sent it to Lucy.  

“Thanks.”  Maggie looked up then, and saw Kara bounding over to them from the other side of the courtyard.  

“Hey guys!” she cried, and she stopped just short of crashing into them.  “What’d you think?”

Maggie grinned.  “It’s not as nerdy as I thought it would be.”

Kara snorted.  “Jackass.”  She turned to Lucy, then, and Lucy expected her to modulate her warmth a little, but she didn’t.  She smiled at Lucy like she’d been waiting all day and all night to see her.  “Hi, Director Lane.” 

Lucy smiled at her.  “Alex’s sister, right?”  Maggie could see her hunting her memory for the name.  “Kara?”

Kara nodded.  “Yeah.  Did you come to watch the exhibition?”

Lucy shook her head.  “No, I just had a question for the General.”

Kara nodded.  “Well, they’re just wrapping up, let me bring you down there.”

She was wearing a three-quarter-sleeved shirt and her forearms were visible, with the ever-growing collection of golden tattoos gleaming in the sun.  “Nice art,” Lucy commented.  “I guess Alex did those?”

Kara nodded.  “Yeah.  Gotta be some advantage to having a tattoo artist for a sister, right?”  Her grin was so particularly infectious, even serious Lucy smiled a little.  

Lucy was still mildly annoyed with herself.  How did she not notice that Alex Danvers did metallic work when she was in the shop before?

“Mags, you gonna come post-game with us?  Pizza and milkshakes, usually.”

“Well, I’m vegan, actually, but I’ll figure it out.”

Kara wrinkled her nose.  “Ew.  Why would you do that?”

“You don’t complain when I make you popcorn.”

Kara flipped her the bird.  “Whatever.  We’ll find you some cardboard to eat or something, just come with.”  She glanced back and forth between them.  “Come on, guys.  I’m sure Alex won’t mind you saying hi, Mags.  Let’s go!”

  
  


********

  
  


Lucy had been to see Astra a few times in the last six months or so, and this was by far the happiest and most energetic she’d seen her.  Whatever she had with Alex was doing good things for her.  She couldn’t help feeling a little gratified that they had made the deal they had, and that she saved lives, and that one of them was Astra’s.  There weren’t many Kryptonians left in the galaxy.  Lucy couldn’t explain why it meant something to her to keep one of them alive, but it did.  There was a great deal she didn’t know about them, but the little she’d seen was that they were, while different in ways, every bit as flawed and noble and hubristic and complicated as humans, and deserved to exist and draw breath just as much as humans did.

She wore combat boots and strolled through the mud with effortless ease, sauntering up to Astra, who was standing with the Greek general, bickering mildly about her application of the rules while they simultaneously complimented each other’s fighting styles.  “General,” she called.

They both turned.  

Astra’s look became one of tense recognition.  “Director Lane.”

_ Nobody is ever happy to see me, _ she thought.  Came with the job.  She amended her thought.   _ Lena is usually happy to see me.  And Kara, at the very least, didn’t seem specifically unhappy to see me. _

“Don’t worry,” she assured Astra.  “You’re not in any trouble.  I just wondered if you could help me with something I’m trying to make sense of.”

Astra nodded, excused herself from her conversation with the Greek general, and they went over to the shade near the wall.  “What can I do for you?”

Lucy craned her neck a little to look up at her.  “Well, I’ve been wondering if you know the Burning Angel.  Her powers seem a lot like yours, thought maybe she was someone you knew.”

Astra regarded her thoughtfully for a moment.  “Why are you looking for her?”

Lucy chuckled.  “Why does everyone say that when I ask about her?”

Astra shrugged.  “She is not bothering anyone.”

Lucy smiled.  “No.  She saved someone important to me.  I want to thank her.”

Astra’s face was inscrutable.  “I do not think she does what she does to be thanked.”

Lucy shook her head.  “Don’t think it escapes me that you’re not actually answering my question.”

“I cannot help you,” Astra said.

“That’s not saying you don’t know her,” Lucy pressed.  “Just that you can’t help me.”

Astra shook her head.  “The Burning Angel seems like a Kryptonian, but… more than that, I cannot tell you.”  She leaned in conspiratorially.  “I must tell you though, Director, that the alien community is an insular one, and that if she does not wish to be named, they will not be likely to deliver her to you.”

Lucy glanced past Astra’s bicep to see Kara, her gold tattoos shining in the sun, chatting with the point of Astra’s spear, the leader of her shield wall; James Olson, her old love, and a spoke in the triangle she’d once attempted.  The Roman armor suited him, she hated to admit.  She knew he was studying with Astra but she was sort of hoping she wouldn’t run into him today.

She nodded sharply, tugging herself back to the conversation.  “I see.  Well, then there’s just one other thing.  Since you’re into all this Greek and Roman stuff, I wonder if you recognize this artwork?”  She pulled out her phone and opened the picture that Maggie had sent her of the suspect’s tattoo.

Astra nodded.  “Yes, that is Alex’s work.”

“Yes, but,” Lucy pressed, “do you know what it’s supposed to be?”

Astra shook her head.

The Greek general, Antiope, came back over at this moment and leaned over Lucy’s shoulder.  “Oh,” she remarked.  “Yes, I know this artwork.  It is King Cadmus, fighting the dragon.”

Lucy’s eyes narrowed.  “Are you sure?”

Antiope laughed.  “Yes, of course, I have seen the original on which it is based.”

Lucy nodded slowly, digesting this information.  “Thanks,” she said after a moment.  “You’ve both been helpful.”

She saw Maggie Sawyer, talking to Alex, and knew without hearing her words that she was flirting shamelessly.  She stomped through the mud and walked up just in time to hear her saying, “...since you missed it, I would be happy to describe it for you in loving detail…”  Lucy rolled her eyes, clamped a hand down on Sawyer’s shoulder and said quietly in her ear, “Hey, Casanova.  The tat?  King.  Fucking.  Cadmus.”


	16. The Divine Message

When the wagons lit out from Birmingham, it was 1866. The war between the North and South had ended, and the freedmen now pondered their fates. They thanked the Aten for moving Lincoln’s heart to release them from their bondage. They had heard that there was gold to be found in the West. So many laid down their plowshares, left the homes of their former masters, and headed to California.

In truth, they were fleeing. Their lawful freedom, they discovered, did not mean that they were being released into a just society. The masters, being resentful of their lot, refused them gainful employment, or shot them rather than let free those souls that they had deemed their rightful property.

And then a strange thing happened. Being Christian, the masters did not wish to quarrel any further with the white man, nor the Christian man, so they released their rage upon the Atenist abolitionists who had passionately lobbied Lincoln to bring their wishes to bear. For a faith that come to America largely in the bellies of slave ships, it had crept into the hearts of enough free white folk, first the poor and then those of means. The masters began to blame the Atenists, and come out with torches to burn the homes of those few who bore the Aten’s sign upon their door.

But the West held stretches, vast and untouched, where they could form a new land, far from the oppressive masters, where those born free and former slaves alike might live alongside one another in the Aten’s light, as they were meant to. Some slaves who had taken their masters’ faith of the nailed god, Jesus Christ, shrugged off those shackles and gave themselves to the Aten. After decades upon decades of being denied the ability to read or write, their minds cried out with joy at the taste of knowledge and rationality. If there was no justice to be had in the East, they would pursue it into the setting sun and grasp in the West.

The wagon train swelled as it moved West. They followed the Aten’s light, heard its divine message, prayed to the god that their ancestors had loved in Egypt, and when they found the settlement in California, they built their temple there, facing the ocean, and they prayed to Akhenaten that they would be blessed, and to Nefertiti that they would be prosperous, and it is there, upon the water, that their city stands even today, a light unto the nation. But no child of the Aten ever forgets the persecution of those ancestors brought to American shores in slaver’s ships, those who were denied the light of knowledge, those who were punished for fighting for justice, for receiving it. No child of the Aten is ever allowed to forget that they were driven from the East by masters with grudges to settle, no matter how peaceful and prosperous a home they enjoy here in the sun’s gold light.

 

  
*******

Lucy was passing through Horemheb Park the next day, turning over in her mind the discoveries of the previous day: Maggie Sawyer’s reasoning on testing for fentanyl, and the emergence of this figure from the drycleaner case, and his tattoo being iconography of King Cadmus slaying the dragon. There was no way it could be a coincidence.

Lucy knew she was one to see Cadmus around every corner, but honestly, what were the odds?

Sawyer said that after she spent her Saturday afternoon in the company of the Danvers sisters and Astra, that she’d be chasing down security camera footage from the library and the adjacent buildings to see if she could get an eyeball on anybody that met the description of their man, admittedly vague though it might be.

In the midst of this stream of thought, she was nearly plowed down by Kara Danvers, who was jogging, or rather, dashing, through the park. “Hey!” she cried, not realizing at first who it was.

But Kara turned around, and her smile was warm and friendly when her eyes found Lucy’s face. “Hey there! You again, huh? We gotta stop meeting like this, Director Lane, or people will talk.”

Lucy couldn’t help smiling. “Aten’s blessings, Kara. Where are you headed in such a hurry?”

Kara shrugged. “Nowhere, really. Sometimes I just build up a little bit of speed and it feels good.”

Lucy’s eyes settled on Kara’s forearms, where the golden tats gleamed. “I’ve heard the angel has tats just like those. Does Alex work on the Angel?”

Kara grinned impishly. “Nobody else in town does these kind of tats, that I know of.”

Lucy frowned, though she couldn’t bring herself to get too frustrated with those twinkling eyes. “Nobody gives me a straight answer when I ask about her.”

Kara shook her head. “Maybe you’re trying too hard.”

Lucy didn’t know what in the world that meant.

“Anyway,” Kara breezed onward, glancing around, “I was just about to grab a rice pie from that food truck, you want one?”

Lucy shrugged. She was actually a little embarrassed that she didn’t make more of a habit of sampling alien food, given what her job was. “Sure, what’s in it?”

“Meat. In sort of a… a gravy.”

That was all Lucy needed to hear. She didn’t ask what kind. She’d had about enough kale smoothies to last her a lifetime. Something involving rice and meat and gravy sounded like just what the doctor ordered.

As they drew closer to the truck, she got a load of the proprietor; a big, broad-backed, scaly Brev’vozi in a regulation white food-prep apron and plastic gloves with four large fingers. “Wow, that truck’s not b.s.” Just like people had done with other human cultures, some intrepid humans had taken to making their own cribbed versions of alien foods.

“Yeah, they’re not knockoff rice pies, Raza’s truck is the real deal.”

Kara ordered two for herself and one for Lucy. Lucy tried to take out money, but Kara wouldn’t take it.

“Your money’s no good,” she said firmly.

Lucy bit into the pie. The shell (you couldn’t really call it a crust) was warm, chewy, and stretchy, a wonderful, comforting texture, and then inside was a ground meat concoction, heavily spiced, that dripped a little gravy when she bit into it. “Oh … Aten on a pony … oh, wow….”

Kara laughed. “Told you.”

Lucy nodded vigorously and they polished off their pies, still standing a few feet from the food truck. There was a visceral thrill she couldn’t quite articulate, eating something messy, standing up, outdoors, dripping gravy. They grabbed a few napkins and sat down on a bench to talk while they wiped their fingers.

“I can’t believe I’ve gotten this far in life without that,” Lucy exclaimed. She glanced up at the truck proprietor again. “It’s a bit … brave of him, being this far uptown, though?”

Kara frowned. “What do you mean?”

“Well, you know…” Lucy floundered. “The district is relatively safe. People expect to see stuff there. People don’t get weird about a giant lizard manning a food truck.”

Kara shrugged. “So what? It’s not illegal for him to be up here, in this part of town.”

“Yeah,” Lucy acknowledged, feeling a little uncomfortable. “It’s just unusual. You don’t see many aliens up here.”

Kara shook her head. “Listen. I’d bet money that there are a couple dozen aliens in this park right now, and you don’t notice them, because they look human. They ‘pass.’ But they’re just as alien as Raza. He has nothing to be ashamed of. He shouldn’t hide downtown just because people aren’t used to seeing Brev’vozi up here. He has something to offer. People should just accept it.”

Kara was seeming suddenly agitated as she said this and Lucy tried again. “So then why do you think the Angel doesn’t come out and say who she is?”

Kara paused, peering at her strangely for a moment. “I don’t think she’s hiding. I just think she doesn’t want the good things she does to become about her. I think she doesn’t want to be a rock star like Superman. She’s just letting her light shine.”

Lucy arched an eyebrow at her. “You sound real sure of that.”

“Educated guess.” There was that impish little smile again. “Anyway, the point is, Director Lane–”

“Please, it’s Lucy. You’ve watched me eat a rice pie, we can be on a first name basis.”

“Well the point is, Lucy… I’m not disrespecting the job you’ve done at all, I heard what you did for my sister, and for Astra … but justice doesn’t stop at immigration laws. It doesn’t stop at neighborhood borders. It doesn’t stop at keeping the peace. It’s also about people being able to be proud of who they are, and not having to hide.”

“Even if it’s for their own safety?”

“Especially if it’s for their own safety.” Kara glanced around, waved a gold-tattooed hand as she spoke. “Nobody should have to live in fear because of who they are.”

Lucy’s face clouded over as she considered what Kara had said. The words struck too close to home for her, on more than one level. She was going to need to think about this. She mustered a smile. “You’re pretty smart, you know that?”

Noticing Lucy’s turn of mood, Kara seemed snap herself out of her own train of more serious thought, and she smiled at her again. “Well, not to brag, but I do have two master’s degrees.” She tilted her head to the side, as if listening to something far away. “I have to get going, Lucy, but it was great running into you. Talk to you soon?”

Lucy nodded. “Aten’s light be upon–” she began to say, but Kara was already jogging away, and was halfway to the park gate. Lucy shook her head. She marveled that cynical Alex Danvers could have a sister like that. She marveled that she had not thought of remaining closeted as a matter of justice. She guessed it was a good thing she was happily married or she might fall hard for a girl like Kara Danvers.

  
***

  
“So, your first bunch of articles haven’t been terrible,” Cat Grant commented as she sat across from Kara, picking at a chef’s salad.

Kara smiled. “Thanks.” She had honestly thought that she wouldn’t have much contact with Cat once she actually started her job at the Tribune, but Cat had gone out of her way to invite her out to lunch. It felt good.

“I do notice you’ve quoted Lena Luthor in three out of seven of them, though.” She sipped her water, and then picked up her fork and poked at the lemon floating in it.

“Yeah, well…” Kara fidgeted in her seat. She couldn’t tell if Cat was calling her out on her crush, or…

“I know you haven’t been in town long but you need some more sources.”

“Oh!” Kara gave a huge sigh of relief.

“Honestly, Northwestern has a good science department, call your professors or something. You can’t use Luthor for everything, you’ll look like you’re not objective.”

Kara nodded.

“Other than that, you’re doing well. I’ve heard good feedback from editorial. And so far, you’re not letting your flying around saving people activities interfere with meeting your deadlines.” She didn’t look up to confirm whether she was right, she just stabbed a piece of her salad and popped it into her mouth.

Kara sat with her mouth open for a moment. She shouldn’t be surprised, really; she got recognized in the district all the time. It was just that nobody who knew her personally had called her out like that before.

“Close your mouth, Kiera, something’s going to fly into it. Of course I know you’re the Burning Angel.”

“How... long have you known?”

“I knew when you appeared out of nowhere and saved my son’s life and Pokemon card.”

“Wait…” Kara stopped, trying to wrap her head around it all for a moment. “The Trib was the first to call me that. YOU gave me the name Burning Angel?”

Cat looked at her, a little smirk playing around her mouth. “Who else?”

Kara fumbled for a moment. Then she got mildly indignant. “What kind of superhero name is that, anyway?” she demanded.

Cat snorted and batted her indignation away with a manicured hand. “Please, Kiera, what would you have gone with, Supergirl?”

Kara flushed a little. “Well, not to tell a family secret, but he is actually my cousin.”

Cat made a little sound of acknowledgement. “But the Super thing is already a brand. Do you particularly want to define yourself by a man, even if it’s your cousin?” Before Kara could respond, Cat plowed ahead. “Of course you don’t, it was a rhetorical question.”

Kara frowned. She was quick, but as a conversationalist, Cat often moved annoyingly too fast for her.

“Anyway,” Cat went on, not seeming to notice Kara’s discomfort, “how are you planning to handle your coming-out?”

“My what?”

“People have questions, darling. And if you don’t frame your narrative for them, they’re going to make up their own, and it could well be something you won’t like.”

Kara nodded. Of course Cat Grant would think of this in terms of media narrative, but media was the deity that cut across all faiths in America. “I’ve been thinking about that, actually. I’ve been feeling that I’ve been playing things too safe.”

Cat lifted an eyebrow. “Planning on releasing your name and address?”

Kara shook her head. “No no, I just mean… look, rescuing puppies from a burning animal shelter isn’t exactly controversial.”

“If you look hard enough I’m sure you can find an anti-puppy corner of the Internet.”

“Maybe, but you know what I mean. I want to take a stand about things that matter to me.”

“Well,” Cat said after musing for a moment, “it depends what the things are. Because you can court controversy in a smart way, or a dumb way.”

Kara grew frustrated. “It’s not about courting controversy. I just … I know there have been a lot of crimes against aliens lately and I’ve been thinking that I haven’t said or done as much about it as I should.”

Cat nodded slowly. “Alien rights. I like it. You want to position yourself as the ‘defender of the alien community,’ hm?”

Kara peered at Cat for a moment, digesting that phrase. “Yeah, I mean… I hadn’t articulated it quite that way, but yeah.”

“Well, that’s why I’m the Queen of All Media and you’re a fledgling columnist who superheroes on the side.” She sipped at her water. “Which, by the way, do you intend to keep doing that on the side, or do you plan to go full time Angel at some point?”

Kara sighed. “I don’t want the good things I do to be because I’m on someone’s payroll.”

Cat nodded. “Well, Kiera, you’re on my payroll, but let’s not get into that now. So, you want to make your intentions known and tell the world what you’re all about, hm?” And then she pounced. “Give me the exclusive and I’ll help you craft the message.”


	17. The Houses of the Wicked

> The National City Tribune, September 30
> 
> Exclusive First Interview with The Burning Angel:  
> 
> “I Stand With the Marginalized”
> 
> By Cat Grant
> 
>  
> 
> The Burning Angel has, despite becoming one of the most popular figures in National City, not given interviews.
> 
> Not until now.
> 
> Seated, she’s unimposing, cheerful, friendly, her blonde hair pulled back in a tidy little braid, legs crossed, fiddling with loose objects on the table as if she’s full of energy and has nowhere to go with it.  Only the by-now-famous golden tattoos mark her as something more and different than one of any number of eager recent college graduates.  
> 
> Rumors have swirled about the tattoos, what they are, what they say, what they mean.  She laughs about this.  “Well, I’ve been adding them as I go along.  I have a lot more than I did even a few weeks ago.”
> 
> But what are they?  She explains, gives me a guided tour of the shiny gold artwork on her skin.  A lot of complex calculus and theoretical chemistry, Bohr’s model of a hydrogen atom, a star map, a quote from “Romeo & Juliet” (“beauty too rich for use, for Earth too dear”), Earth’s solar system, wrapped from knee to ankle.  She doesn’t take off her shirt to show them but she reports a pair of flaming wings on her shoulder blades.
> 
> “Each one means something to me,” she explains.  “Some represent particular rescues, and some are just more personal things.”
> 
> I point to a set of unidentifiable script on the inside of her left wrist.  “And that?”
> 
> “Those are the names of the family I lost.”  It’s the only hint of sadness she displays in the course of a thirty minute interview.
> 
> Pressed as to the origins of the script, she demurs, but she admits she’s not from around here.
> 
> “I grew up in the Midwest,” she says teasingly, and she knows that’s not what I’m after. 
> 
> The Angel is from a planet that is not Earth, though she doesn’t want to say where.  That planet is gone, now, and so is the culture that went with it.  The Angel is, quite literally, a refugee, here since the age of 12.  She’s made the best of her time here, and has studied science and art, and is learning, as an adult, to make use of the natural gifts that she has apart from her apparent intelligence and earnest, sunny personality:  flight, incredible strength, freezing breath, bulletproof skin… all those powers that we’ve come to see over the last several weeks and that are also vaguely familiar to those of us who don’t live under rocks.
> 
> I ask about Superman. 
> 
> “Yeah, I know who he is,” she says, chuckling.  She flexes her impressive arms covered with golden artwork and adds, “Truth, justice and the American way!”  But then she turns serious.  “But that doesn’t tell you much about what the American way is, or what it ought to be.  If I have a mission statement at all, if I decided to let my light shine now for any one reason, it’s because I think the American way ought to be fairness.  Not just justice, though I think that’s important too, but fairness.  I support the alien community in National City and am here to protect it.  And I’m here to stand with the marginalized communities all over this country.  It’s easy to forget in National City that LGBT communities and communities of color and certain faith communities aren’t necessarily equal; that they have to worry about venturing outside their neighborhoods or their community centers, or their temples, churches, synagogues, or mosques.  I want to stand with those who aren’t seen as equal, who have to worry about their safety just because they’re different.”
> 
> I’ve certainly never heard language quite like that from The Man of Steel…

  
  


***********

  
  


Lucy and Lena spent their Sunday morning as they often did on one of National City’s rare rainy days: indoors, working, drinking coffee, making love, and then idly puttering around with the local news on in the background.

“Hey,” Lucy exclaimed, “they’re talking about the Angel!  She gave an interview.”  Lucy was on the sofa, underneath an afghan, reading a book about the rise of Atenism in the United States following World War II.  Lena wandered in from the kitchen and flopped down next to her.  She seized the remote out of Lucy’s lap and turned it up.

“...in the first interview she’s given, Cat Grant captured some pretty strong statements from National City’s mysterious Burning Angel…”

Lena watched, eyes fixed on the screen.  The photography wasn’t from the article; it was just grainy stills of the Angel’s various exploits that had been captured on people’s camera phones and the like.  The talking heads bantered back and forth while the crawl displayed in bold type:  “I’m here to stand with the marginalized communities all over this country.” 

“Look at that,” Lena muttered.  

Lucy nodded.  “Do you think she’s one of us?”

“What do you mean, Atenist?”  Lena shook her head.  “I don’t know.  I mean, possibly, but they’re also saying she’s admitted to being an alien.”

“She could have converted.  You did.”

But Lucy couldn't exactly forget how similar those words were to what Kara had said to her in the park that time.  Was it possible…?  Maybe.  She let that sit in the back of her mind for a bit while they watched.

Lena smiled and rested her head on Lucy’s shoulder.  The anchors naturally speculated on the Angel’s political leanings, true mission, her reticence to reveal her real name or where she’s from, and so on.  “Hey, did you talk to your Kryptonian?  What did she say?”

Lucy sighed.  “Not much about the Angel, though she agreed that her abilities are Kryptonian.  Her friend gave me a useful lead in another case, though, that might be connected to the library.”

“You still working with the idea that it was my mother?”

Lucy hedged.  “I think we can’t rule it out.  Witnesses said that the guy they saw fleeing the scene in this drycleaner’s case had a tattoo, and apparently, the artwork was of King Cadmus.”

“Okay,” Lena said slowly, “but why do you think it’s linked to the library?”

“I don’t, necessarily, but my friend on the NCPD finds your passing out a little suspicious, so she’s looking into a few things.”  Lucy kissed the top of Lena’s head.  “We’ll find whoever did it, and crush them.”

“With the law, right?” Lena teased gently.

Lucy paused just a little too long before she answered, “Of course.”  She kissed Lena’s forehead.

The piece ended with the anchor finishing up with, “Nevertheless, we now have a clearer sense of who this young hero is, and what motivates her, and it’ll be interesting to see how National City relates to her in the wake of all this new information.”

Lena sat up.  “Oh!  I have something for you.”

Lucy sat up too.  “Oh?  What is it?”

Lena jogged out of the living room, and re-emerged from her office with a big black duffel bag.

“Oh, baby, you got me a duffel bag, you shouldn’t have!” Lucy joked.

Lena rolled her eyes and set it down on the couch between them.  “Open it, you jackass.”

Lucy unzipped the bag and inside was a pile of dark, stretchy looking fabric, what looked like kevlar, some metal bars, coated canvas strip work, a leather belt, and what seemed to be a battery pack.  She looked up at Lena.  “What is it?”

“Take out all the pieces,” Lena urged, very pleased with herself and wanting Lucy to see what it was.

Lucy started pulling out the pieces.  It was a stretchy black outfit, two pieces, pants and shirt, but joined together with heavy elastic strips down the back.  The kevlar pieces, as she took them out and lay them on the couch next to her, looked more and more like a lightweight plate armor:  a chestplate, bracers and rerebraces, greaves, and cuisses, all cut angular and made from a dark grey material.  She noticed that each piece had what looked like a port, and upon examining the battery pack, she noticed that it had five lengths of heavyweight cabling sprouting from one end of it.  “What the…?”

Lena got very excited, then.  “Put on the suit,” she urged.

So Lucy put on the suit.  It was thick fabric, but clingy, flexible; great for combat, she thought.,  “OK.  A cat suit?”

Lena scoffed.  “God, you’re so smart, but sometimes you’re thick.”  She took the breastplate, came behind Lucy, and put it on her, fastening the thick velcro of the straps onto the back.  Then she silently took Lucy’s wrists and put her arms up, and put the bracers and rerebracers on each arm.  

Understanding dawned on Lucy’s face.  “It’s armor,” she breathed.  “Oh my goodness, I love it already.  So, what’s the suit made of?”

“Well, that’s your standard cotton/spandex blend but it’s a special weave - it’s kevlar lined.”

“Mm,” Lucy sighed.  She tapped at the pieces that Lena was strapping onto her, rather tightly, she thought.  “Ow, does it have to be that tight?”

“Sorry, it shouldn’t hurt, but it should be as tight as you can reasonably deal with and still be mobile and comfortable.”

Lucy nodded.  “So, what are the plates made of?”

“Well,” Lena began, and she knew Lucy would love this, “they’re kevlar, BUT they’re also able to take a few hits from an energy weapon.  Not a ton, mind you, so please no strolling in front of Altraxan firing squads, but… if you’re in the field, and you’re in a firefight with some disruptors or something, you’ll be able to take a couple of hits if you have to.”

Lucy bounced in place a little.  “This is beautiful.”

“Oh, and it’s fireproof,” Lena added.

“Of course it is.”

“Now….”  Lena picked up the battery pack.

“Yeah, what’s that for?”

Lena smiled.  She slipped it into a pocket on the back that was clearly designed to hold it, and she heard the snap of each cable popping into the ports on the individual plates.  She flipped a switch, and felt the power surge out of it.  “Now,” she said happily.  “Pick up the sofa.”

Lucy looked at her like she was crazy.  “Come on.  Really?”

“Yeah, really.”

Lucy shook her head, knelt down, and took hold of the sofa.  She nearly ended up flinging it over her shoulders.  “Woah!”   


“Sorry, I should have warned you.”

“So, am I like the Angel, now?”

Lena laughed, “Well, no.  I mean, you can’t fly.  I just … the library has me worried, and I don’t like the idea that my mother might be gunning for you, and I don’t like that she might not fight fair, because she never has before, and so …”  She trailed off, looking at Lucy in her construction and sighing.  “...go check yourself out in the mirror.  I think it looks pretty formidable.”  

Lucy stomped out into the mirrored foyer, flexing her arms and moving them back and forth a bit as she walked.  “I’m gonna have to do some sparring in this stuff, it’s going to take a little getting used to if I’m going to wear into combat.”

“OK, but don’t have the strength enhancements turned on when you spar with anyone.”

“Unless it’s the Angel.”

Lena laughed out loud.  “Yeah, I’d say if you got a chance to go a few rounds with the Angel, you’d probably want that turned on.”

“ _ You’d _ probably  _ be _ turned on,” Lucy jousted.

“Oh, knock it off.”

Lucy did a little half turn in either direction.  She did strike a fierce figure in that suit of armor.  “Some appropriate wear for leveling the houses of the wicked.”

Lena frowned.  She knew the hymn that line came from.  It was not a particularly... user-friendly hymn.  It was one of the Atenist hymns that, when the ancestors were being driven across America, those not of the faith liked to use as evidence of the faith’s depravity and violence.  It was a battle hymn, and Atenists had certainly not invented war.  Lena knew the Bible enough that she could easily find plenty in it if she chose that would be equally violent.  Nevertheless, it was not an often-sung hymn, unless you happened to be in the experimental Atenist regiments of the U.S. military in World War Two.  

“You, uh… you don’t talk like that around your agents, do you?” Lena asked carefully.

Lucy frowned at her.  “Why?  What’s wrong with it?  Don’t I have a right to express my faith?”

Lena sighed.  “Of course, Luce, but… we live in a secular society and people get uncomfortable with expressions of faith in the workplace.  Especially when you’re a government employee.”

“We live in a  _ nominally _ secular society,” Lucy corrected her irritably, “in which we  _ more often than not  _ have the icons of Christianity foisted on us, and I don’t see why I should be ashamed to express my religion.”

Why was Lucy all fired up, suddenly?  Was it the Angel’s big speech?  “Honey, this isn’t about shame.  Not at all.  I’m just … look, I love that you’re so deeply committed to the faith, it’s one of the things I loved right away about you.  I just… you work really hard for unit cohesion, and I just don’t want you creating a hostile work environment and losing people when you seem convinced you need more agents, not less.”

“Hostile work environment?”

“If you get too heavy handed with the religious stuff, I’m telling you, yes, you will create a hostile work environment.”

“But we  _ do _ make war on the wicked,”  Lucy argued.  

“I know you do, honey, I know.  And I love that you do.  I’m just saying you can say that stuff here, with me, but just … maybe make sure you don’t do too much of it at work.”

Lucy sighed, growing frustrated.  “You don’t understand because you’re a convert!”

Lena flinched a little at this.  “That’s not fair,” she said quietly.  “I’ve been in the faith nearly half my life.  I have as much claim to ancestral suffering as you do.”

Lucy put her hands on her hips now, and faced Lena, eyes blazing with defiance.  “It’s not the same thing.  And I can’t believe you’re giving me this much shit about this, you sound like a fucking apostate!”

That stung.  Lena glared at her, but her eyes were also hot, and wet with tears not quite ready to release themselves.  “I can’t fucking believe you,” she raged, becoming very quiet.  “I gave you a giant fucking proton cannon to help you fight your war.  You take my goddamn armor off right now, and get out of here until you’ve cooled off and are ready to hear some sense.”  She turned and started to storm out of the room.

“Wait!” Lucy called.

Lena stopped and turned to look at her.  

“Lena … I… I can’t go out like this, can you at least help me out of this armor before you go storming off?”

“I’m going to our room now!” Lena called over her shoulder as she resumed storming away.  “I’m locking the door and I’m not coming out until you’re gone!”

Lucy spent a good ten minutes unplugging herself and contorting herself to get unstrapped and then unplugged and then out of the black bodysuit and into some non-embarrassing street clothes.  She walked to the bedroom door and tried the knob.  She knocked.  “Lena?  Baby, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have–”

“Get.  Out!” Lena called from behind the door.  “We’ll talk at dinner but I want you to get out of here right now!”

Lucy sighed, dejected, and slouched toward the door.  

_ Well, _ Lena thought, _ that went poorly. _


	18. On A Park Bench in the Rain

So Lucy found herself walking in the late-afternoon gray of Horemheb Park.  She pondered strolling down to the south end of the park to the neighborhood temple of Aten, maybe there’d be a prayer group, or she could volunteer to help with something before the sundown devotional.  

But no, her heart would probably not be in it.  When Lucy Lane was upset, she wanted to brood.  The weather was perfect for it; she didn’t even need to be her own little black cloud, as she often could be in these moods.  She could sit in the slate-gray damp and feel properly sorry for herself, and after scowling and berating herself for a bit, she could sulk and wonder why Lena would ever put up with her.

This was not useful behavior, but Lucy was sometimes useless when it came to governing her passions. 

She sat with her head between her hands, listening to the murmurs and laughter of the few passing people, the gurgle of the Fountain of the Priests further down towards the center of the park.  And she prayed quietly, praying for the Aten to send her some judgment, some guidance, to help her work out how to mend the tear she had made.  

“Lucy Lane, as I live and breathe!” came possibly the worst southern accent Lucy had ever heard.  She looked up from the pavement.

Of all people, the Aten sent her Kara Danvers?

“Lucy, you look like someone punched your puppy in the face.”

“I’d almost rather that than this,” Lucy grumbled.  Her decided lack of puppy was beside the point.

Kara plunked down on the bench, not seeming to care it was wet, despite the fact that she was wearing a very short skirt that showed a lot of gold on her legs.  Lucy took note of a golden sun on her knee, and rings that wrapped outward from it around her calf with different colored planets on them.  Rather like the tat described in that article of Cat Grant’s.  She couldn’t help smiling when she noted that Alex had included Pluto.  “You would not.  Nobody actually wants to punch puppies.”  She had a very small jade plant in her hand. 

Lucy shrugged.  “You’re right.  I’m just… not in a good way.”

Kara’s eyebrows drew together with concern.  “Anything I can help with?”

Lucy shook her head.  “Doubt it.  Just had a fight with my, uh…”  She trailed off.  For crying out loud, Lucy scolded herself.  She had so let her guard down that she’d nearly just nonchalantly come out to Kara Danvers.

And then a voice muttered in her head,  _ And so what if you did? _

“Partner?” Kara suggested.  “Spouse?”

Lucy shook her head.  “I really shouldn’t burden you with it.  You don’t want to hear it, trust me.”

Kara pouted a little in a way that was entirely too cute.  “Come on.  I’m told I’m an excellent listener.”  

Lucy shook her head.  “No, really.”

“Well, there’s nothing that a rice pie and a potted plant can’t fix.”  She set the little jade plant into Lucy’s hands and waltzed off to the truck.  She returned a moment later with two rice pies in one hand, and one in the other, and she handed one to Lucy.  They scarfed them down without talking, with the little plant sitting in between them on the bench.

“Well, the rice pie helped,” Lucy pronounced upon finishing it, watching Kara lick the gravy off her fingers with glee.  

“The plant will help too,” Kara said.

Lucy scoffed, faint amusement peeking through despite her foul mood.  “What?”   


“Look, whatever you did, go home, and tell your person you’re sorry.  Tell them you love them.  And give them the little plant.”

“The little plant?”  Her voice was incredulous.

“Everyone brings home flowers after they screw up.  The plant is better.  You’re growing something.  It sticks around longer.  Flowers die.  I never understood why people gave cut flowers to show love, when they die after such a short time.”

Lucy was getting whiplash for how quickly her mood had shifted.  “How do you know I’m the one that screwed up?”

“‘Cause you’re the one sitting on a wet park bench in the rain?”

Lucy shook her head, laughing.  “Touché.”

Kara put her hand on Lucy’s shoulder then, and Lucy marveled at how inhumanly warm it was.  “Listen,” she said gently.  “I know it’s usually more complicated than who’s right and who’s wrong, but it’ll resolve much faster if you just go home and say you’re sorry first, tell her you love her, and don’t try to excuse whatever you did, but try to make her understand.”

Lucy didn’t fully understand herself why she’d gotten so fired up and said the things she said, but she knew Kara was right.  She paused.  “How do you know it’s a her?” she inquired, somehow not feeling threatened so much as amused.

Kara shook her head.  “Heterosexuals don’t dance around pronouns.”

Lucy laughed.  It was kind of a relief, actually, Kara knowing.  She’d told Maggie out of necessity, though she suspected Maggie probably knew, but Kara?  Kara had just read her, just known, and it felt so natural and normal and good to talk about it.  “Right again.”

Kara nodded with approval.  “You have a really nice smile.  No wonder she fell in love with you, whoever she is.  Now go home and remind her why.”  She leaned in and gave Lucy a quick hug, (such a warm, unreserved hug!) and clapped her on the arm once before withdrawing.  “You’ll be fine, I promise.”

Lucy watched Kara jog away into the mist and shook her head.  The last time someone had leapt over her walls so easily, it had been Lena.  She thought hard for a minute about what Kara had said, what she wanted to say to Lena, and then she picked up the little plant off the bench and made for home.

  
  
  


****

  
  


Maggie sat at her desk at the station house, with the rain tapping on the window outside, grumbling to herself.  She’d had a great time yesterday, post-gaming after the battle, with Alex, Astra, Kara, James, and a few of those brawny women from the Greek army.  She’d flirted pretty unabashedly with her two prospects, and they hadn’t exactly discouraged her.  At some point she’d been thrown over Astra’s shoulder and carted halfway down the block.  That had been more fun than it ought to have been.  It had been a good day.  She would have preferred to lay in bed late today and then putter around the house, daydreaming about them, but she’d promised Lucy Lane she’d see if she could get closer to the bottom of this today.  

She tore open the manila envelope from the hospital and and looked at them.  It had taken longer than it should have to get them but the results were unambiguous.  At the time of Lena Luthor’s admission to Atenhotep General, she did in fact have a not-insignificant amount of fentanyl traces in her system.  

That solidified the connection, as far as she was concerned, between the crimes in the district and the library fire.  They had to be the same people.  Knowing that their mystery man in the drycleaner case was rocking a tattoo of King Cadmus connected those cases to Lillian Luthor.  Knowing that fentanyl was used in the library fire connected it to Cadmus.  Lane had been right about assuming the worst.

The why of it all was murkier, she thought, as she scrubbed through footage from the cameras in the ATM terminal across the street.  Was the library the target, or was Lena Luthor the target, or both?  Was it all intended as a swipe at Lucy Lane?  There was only one way to get answers to these questions, she thought, and that was to find their man.  The man with the bronze tattoo of King Cadmus on his arm.  The man with the stolen black Burberry trenchcoat.

She looked again at the photocopy of the drycleaner’s ticket for the stolen item.  Had he taken it for a reason or did he just like it?  The witness said they’d seen him go in, but not come out.  Maybe he came out wearing the trench, which covered the tat, and they didn’t notice him.  

The ticket said it was a Sandringham trench, black, gabardine.  Not wool, so if he’d kept the coat, he could conceivably still be wearing it at this time of year, especially on a cool, rainy day like today.  Maggie looked up the coat online.  It was a nice coat.  It was also rather distinctive.  It wasn’t a typical long trench - it hit just below the hip, with a high collar, button sleeves and epaulettes on the shoulders.  It could have been that he’d grabbed whatever happened to be closest to him, but it was an awfully nice trench.  She noticed the price –$1,700– and gave a little whistle.  Their man had taste, and if he didn’t have money now, he’d clearly had some at some point if he knew to take this trench from among the choices available to him in the cleaner’s racks.

She scrubbed and scrubbed. The library fire had happened on a relatively warm day, so the odds were that he wouldn’t be wearing the coat, but if he was, he’d stick out like a sore thumb because he’d be one of the only people on the street wearing one.  

She was getting to the bit where the Angel was descending from the window.  The camera had an angle where she was getting a lot of people’s backs as they faced the spectacle coming down from the library’s fourth floor.  She saw the bright flicker at the right hand edge of the screen that had to be the Angel descending, on fire, per her moniker.  Most of those on the sidewalks had their shirts shrugged off their shoulders and many knelt in the middle of the sidewalk.  This was somewhat uncommon; most people repaired to the nearest park, and a city designed for sun worship, as this one was, had plenty of parks.  But then, on a normal day, one didn’t see a burning angel floating down from the sky with an armload of sacred scrolls.

She was about to give up on this particular tape, when she saw him, just at the right hand edge of the screen.  A figure in a short, black Burberry trench.  He had his back to the camera, because he, like everyone else in the street, was watching this impossible thing taking place.

“Come on, fucker,” she whispered.  “Turn around.”

He moved a little to the left. And then a little more.  She was beginning to think this was not going to yield any fruit.

But then, at last he turned around peering into the lobby of the bank for a moment, frowning.  Then he looked directly up into the camera, and a look of frustration or anger briefly crossed his face as he realized that he was probably burnt.  He walked out of frame immediately.  

This guy was smart, Maggie thought.  But not smart enough.  It was a slightly grainy ATM camera, but it was enough to run facial recognition.  She was about to pick up the phone to call Lucy Lane when she saw the news crawl on the lower part of her computer screen:  “BURNING ANGEL GIVES EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW TO CAT GRANT AT THE TRIBUNE:  ‘I SUPPORT THE ALIEN COMMUNITY IN NATIONAL CITY AND AM HERE TO PROTECT IT.  AND I’M HERE TO STAND WITH THE MARGINALIZED COMMUNITIES ALL OVER THIS COUNTRY.’”

Maggie groaned internally.  She pretty much knew Kara had to be the Angel.  Too many facts pointed to it, even if she was being annoyingly coy about the whole thing.  And now this girl, who had become her friend as of late, had just gone and pretty much asked for a fight with Cadmus.  She probably didn’t even realize it or see it that way.

She needed to bring in Lucy Lane on this.  Both for the DEO’s facial recognition database, which was likely to be more comprehensive than hers, and for the fact that while Lucy, smart as she was, hadn’t seemed to entirely connect the dots with Kara, but she did seem to know her and have some personal investment in looking out for her safety after what she’d done for Lena.

She picked up her phone and rang Lucy.  It rang several times and then went to voicemail.  “Come on, Lane, now is not the time to be incognito,” she grumbled.  She tried again, and this time it went straight to voicemail.  She cursed.  She tried one more time, and when she got the tone, she left a message:

“So, Lane, this is Sawyer at NCPD.  I have a face you might want to run through your databases.  And I thought it might interest you to know that the Burning Angel has just painted a target on herself, so I’m wondering if we maybe want to do anything about that.  Call me.”

  
  
  


************

  
  


Lena heard the penthouse elevator stop, and then heard the door open.  It was a little soon for Lucy to be coming back, but no matter.  Maybe she had cooled off faster than usual.  

She set down her tablet, on which she was reading running commentary on the interview the Angel had given to the Tribune, and looked up.  After a moment, Lucy’s head poked round the door jamb and she was offering a conciliatory smile.  “I'm sorry?” she said hopefully.

Lena frowned at her, but waved her in.  “You really got out of hand.”

Lucy entered, nodding vigorously.  “You're totally right.  I did.  I mean, my experience is very different from yours but I need to find a way to explain that without belittling your commitment to the faith.”  

Lena glanced at Lucy's hands.  One of them held a small potted plant.  “What's that?”

Lucy held it up.  “Instead of flowers…” And she approached and set the little bright green succulent on the coffee table beside where Lena sat.   “Because flowers are temporary, and we’re doing something permanent.”

Lena gave her a bemused look.  It was the sort of soft, self reflective gesture that Lucy wasn't often able to pull off.  “Did you google some list of ways to apologize to your wife after being a jackass?” 

Lucy shook her head.  “No, but I ran into a friend and they got me thinking about things.”

“Lies.  You don't have friends,” Lena jabbed, but her mood had lifted a little.

Lucy smirked.  “Well, then, an acquaintance that I’ve been running into lately.”

Lena nodded slowly.  “I see.  Yes, I’ve got one of those too, actually.  So, what did this … acquaintance say to you?”

Lucy came and knelt down in front of the couch and took both of Lena’s hands. “That I should come home, and tell you that I’m so, so sorry for the terrible things I said, and that I should tell you I love you, and that I should try to help you remember why you love me.”

Lena squeezed Lucy’s hands.  “Luce, I didn’t forget why I love–”

“Sh, listen.”  Lucy was quite serious now, gripping Lena’s hands and giving her that focused stare that made Lena feel like she was the only thing under the sun.  “I’m too fucking righteous for my own good, and I know that.  A lot of it comes from the fact that I didn’t grow up around here.  I grew up in places that were mostly white, mostly Christian, where some of the kids actually believed that goofy myth about Atenists having ambiguous genitalia.  You grew up here, surrounded by the faith, familiar with it, even before you converted.  You never experienced it as a minority faith.  It’s different.”  

Lena nodded slowly.  That made sense.  She had long struggled to understand where Lucy’s persecution complex came from, and they had certainly never talked about it, but that made complete sense.  

“But that doesn’t make your faith any less than mine–”  Lucy broke off.  Her phone was ringing in her pocket.  She persevered.  “–and I never meant to imply that.  I think, I think … the library fire has me nervous. I want to protect you, but a part of me is afraid I can’t.”

“Do you need to get that?”  Lena asked, gesturing to Lucy’s ringing pocket.

Lucy shook her head.  “Whoever it is can leave a message.”  She pressed on.  The phone stopped ringing.  “If the Angel hadn’t been there, what would I have done?  I don’t know.”  She shook her head.  “Lena, you are the only person I trust, the only person who truly sees me, the only person, man or woman, who has ever meant so much to me.  We married quick, and for a reason.  We knew right away we were right for each other.  We were made for each other in the Aten’s light.”

Lena’s chest felt heavy then, in a not-unpleasant way.  Her Lucy, her sweet, intense Lucy.  She was so much, but that was exactly what Lena loved about her.  “I know.”  She leaned down and touched her forehead to Lucy’s.  “I understand you better now, but I wish you had found a better way to express what was inside you.  I understand your fear, because I fear every time you have to do a field mission, that’s why I gave you the proton cannon, that’s why I made you the armor, that’s why I develop all the little tools I make for you, all the time.  Because I want to protect you, too.”

“I know that angels belong to the Christians,” Lucy whispered then, “but I swear the Angel was sent to us by our God, not theirs, because she protected you when I couldn’t.  Something big is coming, Lena, and I intend to keep us all safe.”

Lena didn’t know who Lucy meant by “us.”  She wasn’t sure Lucy did, either.  But she gave her wife a gentle kiss on the forehead and said, “I know, baby.  I think so too.  And–”

Lucy’s phone began ringing again.  Lucy sighed with disgust and took it out of her pocket.  Lena heard her mutter, “I’ll call you back, Sawyer,” as she turned the ringer off and tossed it across to the other sofa.  Then she tilted her head back and kissed Lena’s mouth, and she was as passionate as Lena had ever felt.  

She felt Lucy’s hands carefully, reverently begin unworking the buttons on her blouse.  “Please,” Lucy was whispering, and Lena could feel her shedding warm tears onto her chest.  “Please, can you forgive me?”

Lena stroked Lucy’s hair and kissed her and acquiesced to Lucy’s gentle but insistent move to slip her shirt off by lifting her arms.  “Of course.  Always.  As long as there’s sun in the sky.”

They had made love a few times since the fire, and Lucy had always been so ginger, so careful, not quite believing that Lena was fine to handle things the way they often liked them.  But now, Lena knotted her fingers in Lucy’s hair, yanked her head back, and said softly, staring intently into Lucy’s tear-stained eyes, “I need you.  Now.  Right now.”

And Lucy clambered up onto the couch, into her lap, wrapping her legs around Lena’s hips, and there they kissed rough and full of ardor till their lips were swollen, and then Lucy was tearing Lena’s clothes off, and making love to her there on the couch, and they whispered to each other,  _ Yes, I love you, Yes, I need you, You’re everything, I love you. _

And over on the other sofa, Lucy’s phone silently buzzed away with a call she had no intention of answering.


	19. Nothing More Important

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> From the Co-Authors:
> 
> Ya’ll may have noticed that this story hasn’t been updated for some time and that a name is missing from our credits. Reasons being that our friend and main author of Myths has decided to take a hiatus from the internet and fandom for an indeterminate period of time. 
> 
> We weren’t quite sure what do at first as we have only a few more chapters of what was to be a much longer multi arc work that we'd been worldbuilding and storyboarding together for much of this year. However, with her permission we’ve decided that y’all should know how at least this arc of the story ends.

Susan was running maintenance on her machine. She had her earbuds in, with that look of concentration that Alex knew meant she was listening critically to a recording of herself.

“I thought it was a good battle,” Alex said. “I know Antiope almost pulled the rug out from under us, but it was good. It was exciting.”

Astra shook her head. “I still maintain that she changed tactics too drastically for the simulation to have been useful.”

Alex frowned. “What do you mean, useful? This is all supposed to be for fun, right?”

Astra shrugged. “I am studying tactics.”

Alex shook her head. She’d loved swinging a sword and wearing armor and the only thing sexier than Astra in gleaming Roman general’s armor was peeling her out of dirty, mud-splattered Roman general’s armor. And she supported Astra’s interest in learning and studying history and Earth’s civilizations. But there was always a seriousness to this that bothered Alex. “But I’m not. I’m done with making war.”

Astra shook her head and looked gently at her. “A warrior who lays down her sword is still a warrior. It is better to keep the sword still sharp.”

Alex wasn’t satisfied with this, but she moved on.

“Anyway,” she sighed.

Astra gave her a raised eyebrow from where she sat in Alex’s chair. “Anyway?”

“It was nice that Maggie showed up,” Alex remarked.

Astra nodded slowly. “It appears that we both invited her separately. You when she came to drop off the brochure, I when she was I class.” She lifted an eyebrow. “What do you suppose this indicates?”

Alex smirked. “We both like her?”

Astra nodded. “It seems so. She does not seem deterred by the fact that we are together.”

Alex grabbed her work stool, slid onto it, and rolled it over next to Astra. “Well… are we? I mean, she's not really hiding her intentions. But… does it go any further for you than liking her fighting spirit in class?”

“Does it go any further for you than enjoying watching her walk away?”

Alex flushed a little and laughed. “That's a small thing.”

Astra shook her head. “I have seen her walk away several times now. It is a simple pleasure, but not a small one.”

Alex nodded, thinking. “Well, you know. Couples do take thirds sometimes. I've never done it, obviously, but it's not so unusual.”

Astra seemed intrigued by this. “But what is the nature of it? Is it only for sexual enjoyment? Or are they in a relationship where love is shared equally among them?”

Alex shrugged. “It isn't so different from regular couples, I think. Some are just in it for sex, some are in love, some get to know each other and fall in love eventually.”

Astra frowned. “But is it not… complicated? Is there not some chance of one person being pushed out?”

Alex nodded. “Yeah, I think that happens. A lot of people have rules about who's allowed to do what and who can spend time with who, and how often.”

Astra considered this for a moment. She tilted her head and looked at Alex. “You have googled this.”

A guffaw came out of Susan. 

Alex threw a glare over her shoulder. “Thanks, peanut gallery.”

Susan grinned at them. “Look, I'm just saying, you're exactly the kind of nerd that would google the rules of being in a threesome before trying to talk your girlfriend into a threesome.”

Astra was smiling now. “You are not wrong, Susan. Alex is exactly this type of person.”

Alex shrugged. “Look, you know. I spent my entire adult life sleeping with people I wasn't into until I met you. And your experiences were even more limited than mine. I just feel like maybe it would be good to have experiences with other people but do it in a shared way, and keep it part of our shared thing.” She sighed. “Honestly it really wasn't on my mind until Maggie, but..”

Astra rescued her. “Alex. I am, at the very least, curious. Although I cannot quite imagine how it would work.”

Alex wound her fingers through Astra's. “Well, we had ways of figuring things out when you and i were getting together…” 

Astra sighed, remembering. “Yes, the instructional videos were quite useful.”

Susan guffawed again. “I’ve never heard anyone call porn ‘instructional videos’.”

“Susan,” Alex grumbled, “aren't you listening to something more important than this?”

“Are you kidding?” Susan put down the rag she was using to wipe down the outside of the machine. “There is literally nothing more important that I could be listening to right now than you two negotiating whether or not you're going to hit it with this detective.”

“Yeah well maybe you should be worrying about whether you're a little too legato going back into that second coda.”

“I am not! Anyway, I think you should do it.” Susan secured her earbuds and fishing her phone out to restart the recording. “She's cute.”

Alex shook her head. “We don’t have to do anything,” she said, turning back to Astra. “But if you’re thinking about it, or curious about it, maybe we should talk more about it.”

Alex back pocket rang. She frowned, not recognizing the number. She answered. “Danvers.” 

“Still haven’t quite shaken all your DEO habits, have you?” 

Alex frowned. “Who’s this?”

“It’s Maggie.” 

Alex looked up at Astra and pointed at the phone, silently mouthing to her that it was Maggie. Astra’s eyes sparkled merrily. What luck! 

But Maggie’s voice sounded a little serious. “What can I do for you?”

There came a heavy sigh. “Look, both you and your sister have been really annoyingly coy about this, but I think we need to cut the crap.”

“Excuse me?”

“I think you sister is in trouble. I think she’s the Burning Angel, and I think you did those tattoos, and I think she just painted a target on herself.”

Alex shook her head quickly to clear it. She’d been expecting a different kind of phone call. “What? What are you talking about?”

“Have you been watching Nat 1?”

“No, I’m at the shop. Hold on.”

Alex got up and walked into the back, and turned on the small television. She flicked over to Nat 1, which was the local news station, and saw the chiron: “BURNING ANGEL GIVES FIRST INTERVIEW TO THE NAT CITY TRIBUNE.”

Alex groaned. “Well, okay…”

“That’s not so bad. But she says all this stuff basically declaring herself the protector of the marginalized and defender of the alien community and so on. I mean … Cadmus activity has been ramping up lately, I don’t need to tell you she’s asking for trouble by saying this stuff.”

Alex sighed now, the weight of it matching Maggie’s. “Man, I told her to be careful, I told her to–”

“Yeah, I know, but people have to make their own mistakes,” Maggie interrupted. “I’m gonna do everything I can to watch her back, I think that goes without saying. But this is …”

“Yeah, it’s … it’s not good. Have you discussed this with Lucy Lane?”

“Not yet. I’ve been trying to call her but she’s not picking up. Does she know about Kara?”

“I haven’t told her and I don’t think Kara has either. But she’s not stupid, she has to at least have an inkling.”

There was a beat of quiet as Maggie thought this over. “Alright, I’ll tell my people to look out for your sister, but see if you can’t get Lucy. Anyone coming after the Burning Angel isn’t likely to be using weapons that kevlar is going to do much against.”

They hung up.

Astra was standing behind her, and placed a hand on her shoulder. “She is standing for what she believes,” she said softly. “It is good that she has Maggie to watch after her.”

“But it’s not enough. We need Lucy.”

“We will have Lucy.”

“I didn’t want to involve her in Kara’s whole deal, but there’s no way around it now.”

“Yes, it would have been better if you had involved her sooner.”

“Why do I feel like this is going to end with me taking up the sword again?”

Astra turned her around and looked into her eyes. “Because you are a warrior. And when the choice comes to defend those you love, you will take up the sword again, every time.”

Alex slipped her arms around Astra’s waist and leaned into her for a minute, closing her eyes and soaking in the feeling of her warm, solid body. 

“Only now, you will have mine beside you.”

 

******

 

Maggie sat at her desk with the radio on. She’d sent out her mystery man’s face to all NCPD units with a request to ping her if they saw him, but not to engage. She’d been sitting here since she got off the phone with Alex. She’d run her suspect’s face through the facial recognition database but came up dry. And now she was sitting back in her chair, drumming her fingers on the desktop and basically just waiting for something to happen.

Lucy Lane hadn’t called her back yet. The rain’s patter had stopped, leaving her alone at her desk in the half-dark with an unsettling quiet in the room and an uncomfortable tension settling into the base of her spine.

Her phone started buzzing in her pocket. She whipped it out, hoping it was Lucy Lane, or Alex saying she’d gotten hold of Lucy Lane, but it was just Veronica. Again. Sighing, she decided to answer. It wasn’t like she had anything else she could be doing right now.

“What do you want, Veronica?”

“Maggie, you’re in over your head.”

“Excuse me?” She stood up and started prowling back and forth between her desk and the window.

“This stuff you’re chasing, the crimes in the district… I know the guy you’re looking for, and I’m telling you, this is DEO stuff.”

“How the hell do you know what I’m working on?”

“Look, it’s alien crimes, who else is it going to be? But please, Maggie. This is a pulling the thread on the sweater kind of deal.”

“Oh yeah? So, who is this guy?”

“I know who he is. If I give you his name, will you promise to just let this one be the DEO’s problem?”

“Why do you care?”

Veronica sighed. “Look, Maggie, getting married was probably the worst idea either one of us has ever had in our lives. It doesn’t mean I want to see you hurt.”

“Maybe you didn’t get the memo, but this detective thing is actually a dangerous job.”

“Yeah, yeah. Listen. This guy you’ve been chasing, his name is John Corben. He’s on Lillian Luthor’s leash.”

“How do you know?”

Veronica sighed. “You know what kind of people I do business with, Maggie, do you really want to ask me that?”

Maggie grunted. “Probably not. Do you know what all this weird activity is? Do you know why he burned the library, and why he tried to kill Lena Luthor?”

“That, I can’t tell you. I have my suspicions but I don’t want to give you bad information. But please, give this to the DEO. Lillian Luthor is planning something big, and I’d rather you weren’t in the way of it when it all comes down.”

Maggie sighed. “OK, look, I’m a big girl and I can take care of myself. One last question, though. Why didn’t Corben come up in my facial recognition?”

“Well,” Veronica drawled, “if I had to guess, I’d say it’s probably because he’s dead.”

 

**********

 

“They can speculate all they want, but your version is out there, now.”

“Thank you, Miss Grant.”

Cat Grant handed her son a glass of milk, and Kara a glass of wine, as they sat in Cat’s penthouse and watched the coverage unfold on Nat 1. Carter Grant pointed at Kara’s wrist, where there was a very small tattoo in red and blue, edged with gold. “Hey, you have the Superman symbol.”

Kara smiled. Her being from Krypton and related to Superman was one of the things that they had agreed they’d keep a lid on, for a number of reasons. 

“Thank you for not printing my name,” Kara said after a moment of listening to the four talking heads on Nat 1 going around, taking turns picking apart every word of Cat’s article.

Cat shrugged. “I don’t really see the point. It’s not as if you go out of your way to disguise yourself.” She gestured to all of Kara’s tattoos, which were very visible today, as she wore shorts and a short sleeve tee shirt. 

“I figure I’m just going to Jodie Foster it for a while and see how that works out.”

Cat rolled her eyes. “You’d be surprised at how much work it was for Jodie Foster to be that closeted while not looking like she was working at it.”

She glanced at her phone. A text from her cousin, Kal-El. Or Clark. Or Superman. Or whatever the hell he was called. Kara I’m proud of you superheroing but this interview was a bad idea. She rolled her eyes and put the phone back to sleep.

She smiled. “I’m not that worried about it, really. I just don’t want to be getting phone calls from weirdos and stuff.”

Her phone rang. She pulled it out and looked at it. It was Alex. She answered. “Hey Alex.”

“Don’t give me ‘Hey, Alex’,” Alex snapped. “You went and gave Cat Grant an interview and you didn’t even discuss it with me or Astra?”

“Sorry, Alex, I just … I didn’t think you’d be upset.”

Alex sighed. “It wouldn’t even be that bad but you said some stuff in there that’s going to be taken as a challenge by people with grudges against aliens, for one thing.”

Kara snorted. “Bring it on,” she retorted. “I’m bulletproof and I can bench press a subway car. What can they do to me?”

“Kara, I worked for the DEO and trust me, you don’t know what’s out there. Hell, I don’t even know everything that’s out there. I told you when you came out as a hero to be careful. This is not being careful.”

“I just wanted to take control of my story, Alex. People make all kinds of guesses about who I am, I just wanted to have my own version of it out there.”

“Kara, you rescue kittens out of trees and save children from forest fires and build houses for Habitat for Humanity. I think it’s pretty clear who you are to anyone paying attention.”

Kara heard fire sirens just then. That was odd, she thought. It had been raining all day. What are the odds that there would actually be a fire, now? “Alex, I think I gotta go.”

Alex sighed. “Just, be careful, Kara.”

One of the anchors looked into the camera and intoned, “And this just in, a fire in the alien district, firefighters are rushing to the scene. We’ll have more for you on this story as it develops.”

“I heard that!” Alex shouted. “For crying out loud, Kara, let the firefighters handle this one.”

“I can’t!” Kara jumped up. “This is my community, Alex! I just went out in the media and said that I was there for the community!”

“Just watch your back!” Alex shouted back.

Kara hung up the phone.

Cat glanced up calmly. “Oh, are you going to take that?”

Kara gestured to the balcony. “Do you mind if I leave that way?”

Cat waved dismissively. Carter gripped his mother’s hand and watched as Kara jogged out to the terrace and then took off into the sky.

 

******

 

Lucy woke on the sofa, from her soft, drifting sleep to find that Lena had, at some point, gotten up, and covered her with a soft cashmere throw. Dusk was approaching. “Babe?”

“In the kitchen,” Lena called. 

Lucy yawned and sat up. After a moment, she stood, gave a catlike stretch, and pulled the throw around herself in a haphazard way, not really trying to cover anything. She glanced over at the other sofa, where her phone still sat. Sawyer had been trying to reach her. She picked up her phone. 

“Holy hell,” she muttered as she wandered into the kitchen. She had apparently six missed calls and two messages from Maggie Sawyer, and a dozen or so texts from Alex Danvers. “What the hell has been going on out there?”

Before she could check any of them, the phone rang again. It was Sawyer. “Hey Sawyer.”

“‘Hey, Sawyer?’ Are you a crazy person? Why haven’t you been answering my calls?”

“Marital stuff, I’m sure you can relate. What’s going on?”

“Well, while you were busy being marital, I got a name for you on the drycleaner thing, and I’m pretty sure that the same guy is connected to the library at the very least, and probably a lot more, AND he’s tied to Lillian Luthor. And his name is John Corben. Know him?”

Lucy felt the color drain from her face. “That... was who Lex hired for his ill-fated attempt on Lena’s life last fall. But he was … he got killed. The cops shot him and he was pronounced dead at the scene.”

Lena was looking up with alarm, now.

“Yeah, well. Apparently your mother in law got her hands on him and did some Frankenstein shit and he’s not dead anymore. He’s enhanced.”

Lucy cursed under her breath. “Enhanced how?”

“Don’t know.”

“What do you need from me?”

“Backup. I have pretty good reason to believe that he’s after the Angel.”

“Why?”

“Well, she just basically called out Cadmus in the media. Not by name, but she declared herself the defender of the alien community.”

“Yeah, I thought that was great.”

“Yeah, well, maybe, but think about it. She’s made herself a target now. And I don’t think it’s safe to assume that Lillian Luthor, of all people, doesn’t have something that might be capable of hurting her.”

“Have you found him?”

“Not yet. My guys were told not to engage but I’ve had a few pings on him being downtown in the last couple of hours, and now there’s a fire in the district, right fucking now. She always shows up to fires. It’s gotta be a trap.”

“Because it’s been raining all day, so a fire seems a little questionable,” Lucy finished.

“Yeah. I’m going down there. Can you meet me? We help out the Angel, and we get our man.”

Lucy nodded. “Yeah. I’ll be right there.” She hung up, and looked at Lena. “Baby, where’s that beautiful suit you made me?”


	20. A Soldier of the Aten

_“Oh living Aten  
You terrify the enemies….”_

In the low gloom of her bedroom, Lucy stepped first into the black bodysuit. It hugged her as she pulled up over herself, close as a second skin.

_“...Grant us the slaughter  
Of the unjust and wicked…”_

If there was to be trouble in the district tonight, she would be there to meet it. She strapped the greaves to her shins and pulled them tight. The tension of the wide strap bit into her muscles even through the fabric of the body suit. She fastened the clasps.

_“...Let their seed be like acid  
Let their womb lie barren…”_

She slipped her arms into the bracers, pulling the fasteners tight as a tourniquet, flexing her hands once, twice, thrice, to make sure she was not impeded. She was not.

_“...Let their bodies be stricken by plague_  
Let their flesh rot in the dark  
Away from thy light….” 

She raised her arms and let the breastplate drop down over her head. She positioned it against her chest, and stood straight and still as her wife came behind her and pulled the straps, and then fastened them. 

_“...Make war on the wicked_  
O followers of the Aten!  
Lay siege to their cities  
Lay waste to their peoples  
Let no stone stand upon another…” 

The Aten had given her this wife, this armor, this ally in Maggie Sawyer. The Aten had given her this opportunity to stand in defense of the Angel, to stand before the plans of Cadmus and say, “STOP.” She would not flinch. She would not fail.

_“...That the houses of the wicked may be levelled_  
That their blood may flow in rivers through the streets…”  
Lena whispered to her, “I have one more piece that I didn’t get to give you earlier.” 

And she approached with a helmet, black and shiny, similar in shape to motorcycle helmet, but lighter and more closely fitted, with a mirrored visor that when pulled down, would cover her face. She placed it on Lucy’s head, then plugged it and the rest of the cables into their respective ports and the suit hummed to life around her. 

She reached up and clicked the jointed metal bars into place between the upper and lower arm pieces, and the upper and lower leg pieces. Her strength would be doubled now, tripled, perhaps. It was a shame she had not the opportunity to test it properly but it would be tested in live combat if all went well tonight.

_“...Let all their endeavors be for naught.  
That their kin may weep and mourn o'er the barren land.”_

She turned to Lena and gave her one last, long look. 

“Go and save the Angel,” Lena told her softly. “Thank her for me, if you can. And come back to me alive.”

 

*********************

There were few moments that gave Kara a simple, unadulterated joy like descending into the heart of a fire, being bathed in its light and flame, and watching the gold of her tattoos heat up and thrum in the light. This one was across from Sappho’s, the gay community center, which had already closed for the night. She knew the building. It was a pool hall with a few floors’ worth of residential apartments up above it. She peered into the flames. They were pouring from the windows already. She hoped that everyone had gotten out by now. 

As she descended toward the block, she could see the fire trucks parked in front, and the clusters of people in the street, human and alien, looking toward their burning homes, peering into the hollowed-out pool hall. She landed in front and approached the lead firefighter. “Hey chief,” she greeted him, “anyone left in there?”

He shook his head. “Not sure, ma’am.” Then he paused for a second and took in her appearance and realized who she was talking to. “You’re sure welcome to take a sweep while we try and get the flames out.”

She noticed that the police presence was a little heavier than usual for a fire. She also noticed that an NCPD paddy wagon was parked across the street and down the block a little ways. An odd thing to find at a fire. She shrugged it off.

She decided to start from the top, since if there were indeed anyone left up there, they’d need her most urgently. As she moved through the floor, calling out to see if she got any responses, she would pause to use her freezing breath to slow the advance of the flames as she moved forward. She didn’t want to be too aggressive with it and actually end up freezing someone or something she didn’t want to. So far, however, so good.

She descended through a burning hole in the floor, down to the third floor, and began to work her way through, calling out, looking through the walls. The heat from the flames always made her vision a bit hectic and she wasn’t sure, but she moved down the corridor, calling out, banging on doors, peering through the flames. A flaming beam groaned and tore itself loose from the ceiling and dropped toward her. She caught it a shower of sparks and heaved it aside, working down toward the end of the hall. 

Then she heard a voice, small and distant. It was coming from below, either the second floor or possibly the ground floor. Could someone be trapped in the pool hall? “Help!”

She sped down to the end of the hallway. “I hear you! Where are you?” She looked around, kicking open first one apartment door and then another. Flames got sucked out into the hallway and engulfed as she stood there. 

“Help!” cried the voice again.

She rose up and then smashed down, then descended through the floor. Her clothes were starting to singe and burn as she landed on the second floor. She peered down then, and through the shifting waves of heat, she thought she saw a human figure on the first floor. She smashed through another set of floorboards and landed in the middle of the pool hall in a shower of sparks and flame.

“I hear you!” she called. “Where are you?”

 

“I’m in the back!”

She shoved the pool table in front of her to one side, and took a quick assessment of the layout of the space to determine what might be the best way to get this straggler out of there. “Can you move?”

“No, I think my leg’s broken!”

She sighed, and began trudging toward the back. “I’ll be right there!”

There was the flaming remains of a bar at the back of the hall. She knew there were beer kegs underneath it that would be likely to blow if they hadn’t already. She grabbed another pool table, flipped it onto its side, and pressed it up against the bar, to mitigate any exploding alcohol. She shouldered her way through the smoke and the doorway wreathed in fire, and pushed her way into the back rooms. 

A man in a black trench lay on the floor in the corner, where the flames were less bad, propped up against some crates. She glanced around. The fire hadn’t spread quite so much here. A burnt-out exit sign hung crookedly from a doorjamb, pointing to a narrow hallway that presumably led out the back of the building. She supposed he hadn’t made for that door because of his injured leg. 

She approached him, and as she drew nearer, he tugged open the trenchcoat, and she saw a strange array of metal pieces spidering out of the middle of his chest, and a green stone glowing in the middle of it, where his heart ought to be. “What the–?”

But she never managed to finish that sentence. The stone glowed and then shot a ray of green light out of it, as big around as a large fist, and it struck her dead center in the chest, and she collapsed, weakened, and suddenly very much aware of the unbearable heat in this place. “What… what is that?” she gasped, collapsing to the floor.

“Hurts, don’t it?” he replied with a smile, and climbed up from where he sat. He began to draw nearer. His chest glowed again, and then again she was struck by the crippling ray of green light from the center of his chest. Nausea rose in her stomach. She felt the places on her skin burning where the edges of her burnt clothing were pressed against it. She bit back a cry of pain. 

She heard a loud bang from down the narrow hallway that led to the back, and then footsteps. She couldn’t lift her head to see who it was. But then she heard the distinctive sound of a shotgun being pumped, and she recognized a voice, but it was filled with a kind of authority she hadn’t heard in it before. 

“John Corben! You’re a dead man!”

It was Maggie.

Kara lifted her head enough to see Maggie, in her flak jacket, moving closer to the man, who had temporarily turned his focus toward her. 

“I am indeed! But this isn’t your fight, love!” he drawled in an English accent. 

“I’m NCPD, so I’m afraid it is,” Maggie shot back. “Hands up or I’m gonna shoot you in the green, glowy thing.”

Fire was starting to lick and claw its way around the doorframe and into the room. Kara tried to get to her feet again, but it was slow going. She was helpless as she watched Corben lunge at Maggie. She fired a shot directly at him, but it was stopped dead by the metal apparatus on the front of his chest. 

He was upon Maggie in a half a second, tearing the gun out of her hands and tossing it away. He grabbed her then, trying to get a good hold, but she applied some technique that kept them in mid-struggle for a few moments. Please, Maggie, just keep him busy a few minutes more so I can get my strength back and then I’ll help you…

Whatever that stuff was that he’d shot her with, it had really done a number on her. 

Maggie kept him off balance for a few moments more. Kara recognized the hold she was using as something Astra had probably taught her, using acupressure to limit his leg’s mobility and then pushing hard, sending them tipping over into the metal crates. He crashed into them with a loud clanging sound, implying that there was indeed more metal apparatus under the trench. He landed first against them, so Maggie had the wind knocked out of her, but she didn’t seem hurt. But it was still too much. Corben got hold of her jacket, picked her up, and tossed her against the back wall.

Maggie struck the wall and hit the ground, breathless and clearly in pain. 

Corben turned his attention back to Kara. “Well, that was inconvenient. Now…” He cracked his knuckles and they made a weird, metallic sound. “Where was I?”

The door behind her, the one through which Kara had entered the room, burst open, and someone else entered the room. She pushed herself up onto her hands and knees. Her strength was still not with her. She took in the new guest through bleary eyes. Small, in black armor of some kind, and a helmet. 

“You were about to have your ass kicked,” the figure said.

Rao, it was another woman. A small woman, same size as Maggie. That voice… Kara knew it…

Corben rolled his eyes. “For the love of God, do you women insist on doing everything together?”

The new entrant into the combat rushed past Kara and engaged him, rushing at him fists-first. She was quick, skilled, and inhumanly strong. Kara shook her head to clear as the tiny figure landed a punch on Corben that sent him hurtling into the metal crates again.

“Maggie!” the woman in black called. 

Maggie struggled to her feet. 

“Maggie, take Kara, and get out of here. I’ll take care of this guy.”

Maggie was in less than perfect shape, but she nodded, stumbled forward, and grabbed Kara’s hand and pulled her to her feet.

The small figure in black continued raining blows on Corben, who fought back, but found to his chagrin that even when he got a punch in, that she would absorb it, sail backwards and simply regain her footing to charge at him once again. Kara hung onto Maggie as the small figure in black was pinning Corben to the floor, punching him repeatedly in the face, and the flames kept creeping back. 

“Get out of here!” she called over her shoulder at them. “I’ve got this!”

Kara didn’t have much choice, as she had nothing to offer in terms of combat skills at the moment, and Maggie wasn’t in much better shape. Besides, the small, fierce woman seemed to have things in hand.

“Maggie….” Kara wheezed as they staggered toward the rear exit together. The smoke was getting to her and she was coughing, and so was Maggie.

“Yeah, Kara…”

“Maggie, who is that?”

“I dunno, Kara,” Maggie wheezed back. 

Maggie kicked the steel door open and they exited into the cool, damp night. It was a relief on her cheeks. She hadn’t even fully appreciated how hot it was in there until they stepped outside. “Maggie, she sounded like Lucy Lane…”

Maggie coughed, but nodded, and the two of them stumbled away toward the back of the building behind the pool hall. “Yeah, she did,” she finally panted. 

They stood together for a moment, collecting themselves. A few moments later, the metal rear door slammed open, and the figure emerged, dragging an unconscious John Corben behind her with what appeared to be minimal effort. She stopped in front of Maggie. “I saw you had a paddy wagon out front.”

Maggie nodded. “Yeah. Mind dropping him in it?”

She hesitated a moment. “I’d rather not be mistaken for a bad guy.”

Maggie smirked. “You mean you’re running around in all-black armor and a mirrored helmet and you’re worried people might get the wrong idea?”

She deposited Corben on the ground. “Have it your way. I suggest you cuff him.” She knelt down, pushed his trench open, and after a few moments of fiddling, she yanked the glowing green stone out of his chest. Kara felt weak again just looking at it. “He shouldn’t be much trouble to you now that I’ve taken his battery.”

Maggie frowned. “What do you mean, he’s dead?”

“No. I’ve just taken away what’s powering his enhancements.”

“Maybe you wanna leave that with me?”

Kara felt a wave of nausea come over her again. “Maybe she should just take it, it’s making me sick. He shot me with that and it completely blitzed my …”

“Your powers,” Maggie finished. “Kara, can we please cut the shit? I know you’re the Angel, OK? I came here because this looked like an obvious trap, because I had a feeling they were gonna come for you after your ill-advised media statement.”

Kara was too exhausted to do anything but give Maggie a dumbfounded look.

Maggie waved at the mystery woman. “Yeah, fine. Take it.” She knelt down and cuffed Corben’s hands behind his back. “Cool suit, by the way.”

After a beat, the figure pushed the mirrored visor up, and Kara was confronted with the face of Lucy Lane. “Thanks. My wife made it for me.” 

“Can you keep my secret?” Kara asked Lucy quietly.

Lucy nodded. “If you can keep mine.”

Maggie shook her head. “You two jackasses.” She clapped Lucy on the shoulder. “Nice job, Lane. Hope everything’s good with the missus.”

Lucy smiled and then glanced around. “Alright. I better split. Running around like this is definitely going to get me unwelcome attention.”

Maggie kicked at Corben a couple of times. He stirred, barely, but didn’t move. “Look, Lane, I’m sorry, I know you wanna stay in the shadows and whatnot, but can you please just take him out front and throw him in the wagon? You can split after that. I’ll walk out with you.”

So Lucy Lane put her visor back down, grabbed John Corben by the collar of his very expensive stolen trench coat, and sallied forth to the front of the building, into the setting sun, dragging him behind her, and flanked by Kara and Maggie. A few confused looks shot among the cops and the firefighters standing in front of the building. Lucy marched toward the wagon, threw the door open, and flung him unceremoniously inside. 

One of the men gave Maggie a confused look. “Um, Detective–?”

“Yeah, it’s cool, Bernardi. That’s our man. Cuff him up proper in there, will you?”

The officer nodded, glancing with confusion between Maggie and Lucy, whose helmet was still shielding her face. “Okay, but… who…?” He settled his eyes on Lucy. “Who are you?”

Lucy paused for a moment. “A soldier of the Aten,” she answered, and then jogged away. 

Maggie shook her head. “Dramatic asshole.”


	21. Gifts

_After the Fire: Lena & Kara _

The sun was going down while Lena watched Nat 1 anxiously. She never skipped sundown prayer, but this was an exception. She watched footage of her wife, dressed in the suit she’d made for her, tossing a man into a paddy wagon with just one hand. It was kind of sexy, if she was being honest with herself. But she was also wound up, worried that she had encouraged something she didn’t mean to.

Lena was struggling to contain all her feelings about this. 

She saw the figure behind Lucy and to the right, the one next to the cop. Even in the fuzzy news footage, she saw someone who looked an awful lot like Kara Danvers.

Her phone rang. It was Lucy. 

“I saw you on Nat 1, baby,” she purred. 

“Yeah, did it look good?”

“It looked really good.” A pause. Lena could hear street noises in the background. “So what now?”

“Well, now I have to get out of the suit and go down to the station. I really need to be present when Sawyer questions Corben.”

“Okay. How long do you think you’ll be?”

“No idea. Doubt it’s going to be all night though. I’ll let you know.”

“Okay. Did you talk to the Angel?”

“Yeah. She says hi.”

Lena snorted. “Yeah, alright. I’ll see you later.”

“Thanks again, baby. The suit worked great. I’ll see you later.”

They hung up. Lena’s heart was warm in her chest. Her suit had worked. Lucy had kicked John Corben’s ass and had gotten to thank the Angel for saving her life. What kind of a gift was this night?

Her mind was now caught on something though. She picked up her phone again, and called Kara Danvers.

“Hi Lena!” she answered.

“Hi Kara! I saw there was a fire down in your neighborhood, are you alright?”

Kara sounded a little surprised. “Oh! Uh, yeah, I’m fine. I … I wasn’t anywhere near it actually.”

“Really? There was a blonde on the news that looked a lot like you.”

“Well, you know, the camera adds ten pounds.”

“What?”

“I don’t know.”

An awkward pause. “I heard that someone tried to get the Angel tonight. Did you know that?”

“Oh… really?”

“Yeah. That’s what I heard. You know, I’d be really sad if something had happened to her and I hadn’t gotten to thank her for saving my life.”

Kara sighed. “Yes, I understand.”

Another awkward pause. “Kara, what are you doing now?”

“Nothing. Just getting yelled at by my sister and aunt.”

“What?”

“Nothing, why?”

“Well, I just … my wife had kind of a … a stressful night at work, and it's not over yet, and I’m a little … well, I could use a little company. I know we’re supposed to do dinner next week, but I was thinking if you weren’t busy, maybe you’d like to stop by for a …” She frowned. She knew Kara wasn’t a drinker. “...a milkshake?”

Kara chuckled. “Well, you’re speaking my language. I’d love to get out of here, and milkshakes sound great. Can I pick anything up on the way?”

“Like what?”

“I dunno. Sushi? Donuts? Rice pie?”

Lena laughed. “No, I’ve eaten, but that’s very sweet. Just yourself.”

“Okay. What’s your address?”

Lena gave her the address.

“Oh, Atenhotep District, very fancy.”

“You did know I’m a billionaire, right?”

Kara laughed. “Yeah, you seem like a normal person. I forget.” 

“I’ll take that as a compliment.” 

Lena hung up the phone. Kara said she’d be by in about half an hour. She strolled to the elevator that led to the roof deck, and wandered to the edge where the glass altar stood. She murmured a prayer to the Aten, apologizing for her neglect this evening and giving thanks for the success of Lucy’s mission. It was cool and damp, and the night was beginning to clear.

She wondered again, What kind of a gift was this night?

 

**********************

Maggie had yelled at her.

Alex and Astra had yelled at her. They were all glad she was alright, but they needed to find out what that weapon was that Corben had used to disable her. And they were annoyed that she had done something so reckless as declaring herself the way she had.

And Astra was now insistent that she begin proper combat training. “I did not push the issue when you were only rescuing children from car accidents and such, but you are walking into something more dangerous, now. You will need to learn.”

Kara didn’t argue. It was easier with Astra if you just didn’t argue.

So when Lena called, Kara took it as an opportunity to escape any more stern talking-tos. She’d had about enough of that. Having had an hour away from that nasty thing in Corben’s chest, her powers had returned and she was feeling alright, and a milkshake at Lena Luthor’s house sounded like what she needed to put her right.

She stopped in at Tyrell’s Floral, where the cute girl who ran the place gifted her with a little red-tipped aloe rosette in a small terra cotta pot. And then, she took to the sky, arcing across the city, contemplating her good fortune.

What if Maggie hadn’t been smart enough to see how foolish she’d been? What if she hadn’t been able to connect the dots in time? What if Lucy in her incredibly rad armor hadn’t shown up and kicked that guy’s ass? She was lucky to be alive, and she knew it. 

Maybe she’d been stupid, she mused, letting this friendship with Lena develop all this time without telling her that she’d been the one to rescue her from the library fire. How could she call Lena a friend without her knowing that their friendship had begun sooner than Lena knew it had? It felt wrong. What if she had died tonight and not told Lena who she was?

She slowed down as she approached the Atenhotep District, listening for Lena’s heartbeat. She looked down at the rooftops, until one caught her eye: it was large, with a pavilion at one end, a hanging garden, a sitting area, and an altar that looked like it was made of glass. Even in the low light, she could see that it was threaded with gold and probably made by some unusually gifted artisan. She saw Lena, standing in front of it, leaning forward, and heard what sounded like whispered prayers. She circled overhead a few times, then dipped down. 

She drifted slowly up the side of the high-rise, giving last-minute consideration to the wisdom of revealing herself in this manner, but decided it was the right move. Lena clearly had her suspicions, and if they were to be friends, she should tell her the truth. She rose up above the edge of the rooftop, in front of where Lena stood at the altar, and looked down at her as she stood gazing out over the city.

Lena looked up at her, hovering wordlessly in front of her, and her red lips parted in a thrilled little smile. They gazed at each other for a long moment, Kara feeling hopeful that Lena would accept this information, and Lena simply taking it in “I knew it was you,” she said.

“I didn’t know how to tell you,” Kara confessed. “I didn’t know how I was going to go about this whole superhero thing, I just knew I didn’t want to do it the way other people did.”

Lena shook her head. Her eyes darted all over Kara’s body, taking in all her golden tattoos. She laughed a little. “Well, you are unique, I’ll grant you that.”

Kara smiled. 

Lena stepped back and gave a sweeping gesture. “Would you like to come in?”

Kara chuckled at the absurdity of the gesture, and floated over the railing to touch down on the roof deck. She held up the little aloe plant. “You said you didn’t want any food, but I hate showing up empty-handed.”

Lena’s mouth quirked a little. “Actually, I have a buddy for him. Thank you.” 

Kara followed her into the elevator. Lena was looking at all the art on Kara’s body. Her eyes settled on her deltoid, where the star system of Rao lay. “I saw that on your arm when you rescued me. That’s your home, right?”

Kara nodded. “It’s where I come from, yes.” She pointed down to the golden sun on her knee. “But this is my home now.”

Lena smiled. “So, was someone after you tonight?”

Kara nodded. “Yeah, but they didn’t get me. I had backup, luckily.”

Lena smirked as if she’d swallowed something delightful and didn’t want to share a bite. They were quiet for a moment as the elevator stopped at the penthouse floor. “I do want to thank you for rescuing me. And the scrolls. Somehow a milkshake seems a little inadequate, but I guess it’ll have to do for now.”

Kara blushed. “I don’t do what I do because I want thanks. I just want to help people.”

So they sat in the kitchen on stools at the marble island in the center of it, and Lena made them milkshakes, and Kara told her the wild story of her rise to superheroing, along with her rather unspectacular fall that evening. She told her the story of the death of her world and the loss of almost everything she ever knew, and of how her aunt was given back to her, improbably, against all odds. She left out the part about Astra’s involvement in Myriad, for now. She told her all the personal things she’d held back from their earlier conversations so as not to frighten her off or give too much away at once. She talked about having to hide who she was in Midvale, and how her semester in Greece and the friend she’d made there had set a change in motion, made her burn for something different. She was more aware of her mortality than she’d been just two hours ago, and it had loosened her tongue far more than the milkshakes could.


	22. Vegan Ice Cream

_After the Fire: Astra, Alex, Maggie_

In the centuries before its collapse, Krypton had engineered sexual desire out of its people. Well, for the most part. The biological imperative to reproduce was a stubborn thing, and did not always understand that its old method of doing things was no longer needed. It turned up sometimes as a recessive trait, but didn’t always manifest. And when it did, well. The Council had developed treatments for that. Benign enough methods, a shot that would last nearly ten years before it had to be administered again. 

This was especially important in the prison populations, where one could simply not afford to have that sort of low, primitive behavior complicating an already awful environment.

So when it was discovered, when Astra was a teenager, that she was thus afflicted, she was immediately given treatment for it. There was no room in Krypton’s society for such disruptive instincts. Her twin, Alura, never did manifest this, as far as anyone was aware.

Astra had voluntarily continued with the shot while in Fort Rozz, even after she had wrested control of the prison from the authorities and gotten lost in the Phantom Zone. She knew no other way. Why should she want the distraction? It did not seem that sexual desire had done other races much of a favor.

She had been due for another shot at the time that the DEO had captured her. She noticed nothing different at first, and had thought that perhaps she had moved past the need for it at all.

And then she laid eyes on Alex Danvers for the first time, and felt a faint stirring in her body that was dimly familiar, and most unwelcome. It had awakened slowly; even when she first kissed Alex, in a moment that was equal parts curiosity and an aching need for closeness, it had not overcome her. Her craving grew though, and once she was aware of wanting Alex, she would not be satisfied until she had learned what it meant to have her. And then once she’d had her, she was beset with a need to have her again, and again.

Astra had never been particularly aware of wanting any other person since that part of herself had woken up. The voraciousness and omnivorousness with which she devoured other forms of human culture –food, art, music, film, and so on– had not extended to her sexual appetites. She was vaguely fascinated with the idea that Alex understood herself to have tastes and preferences (Women? Brunettes? Outdoorsy types?), for Astra had only one preference; Alex, only Alex, always Alex, and as much Alex as possible.

But now, she was forced to admit, the detective had captured her curiosity. Astra wondered whether it meant that she now had a taste and preference. Women? Smaller women? Women who were competent fighters? 

“Alex,” Astra asked as she curled herself around Alex in bed. “Is Maggie your ...type?”

Alex chuckled a little and burrowed back into Astra’s arms. “Yeah, I guess she is. Why?”

Astra smiled. “I was wondering whether she is also mine. I did not think I had one. But I see similarities between you and her that I had not previously considered. Particularly since she was so instrumental in protecting Kara.”

Alex turned over and faced Astra, her eyes merry as she considered Astra’s line of questioning. “You want her,” she teased.

Astra nodded. “Maybe.”

Alex snorted. “Maybe,” she answered with thick sarcasm.

“You do also,” Astra pointed out.

“Yeah, maybe.”

Astra scoffed. “You continue to be circumspect.”

Alex shook her head. “No, not that. I just want to be sure you really want this.”

Astra sighed. “I think that at the very least, we should invite her for dinner.”

“Okay.”

“She deserves some thanks for looking after Kara.”

“If that’s what you want to call it,” Alex answered, snickering. Seeing Astra’s annoyed expression, she modulated her tone to something more conciliatory. “Look, you’re right. We owe her one for having Kara’s back. Let’s invite her over. No expectations, but you know. If something happens, it happens.”

Astra nodded. “Should we prepare?”

“What?”

“With some instructional videos?” Astra couldn’t keep the eagerness out of her voice. She still was unclear as to how it would work with three, but she was becoming more and more curious to find out. She very much wanted to see it done.

Alex laughed. “I said no expectations.” She tangled her fingers in Astra’s hair, giving her that soft, fond look. “Baby, we’re smart. We’ll figure it out. We’re not as clueless as we were nine months ago.”

Astra was not entirely satisfied, but she kissed Alex, and then they made hot, rough, sweet love, and then they went to sleep.

 

*************************

 

Alex called Maggie the next day. “Thanks for saving my bonehead sister.”

“Yeah, don’t worry about it. She’s one of my favorite people,” Maggie answered lightly. 

“Listen, Astra and I would really love for you to come by this week for dinner. So we can thank you.” Alex winced. Those words came out sounding loaded no matter what she did.

Maggie chuckled, but didn’t pursue. “Yeah, sure. How’s tomorrow?”

“Fine.”

“Should I bring anything? Some beers?”

“Nah. Alcohol doesn’t do anything to Astra, and I’m ten months sober, so, you’d be drinking alone.”

“I’ll bring dessert, then.”

“Okay. And you’re, uh, vegan or something, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay. I have no idea what Astra’s gonna make. We’ll figure something out.”

“I can still eat the important things.”

Alex laughed. “Yeah, I guess you’re talking about peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, right?”

“Totally. I’ll see you tomorrow night, Danvers.”

***********************

Maggie wasn’t entirely clear on Alex and Astra’s intentions in inviting her to their place. She wasn’t sure that they were entirely clear on their intentions, either. But she was excited nonetheless. You didn’t get to just hang around with two women like that every day. 

She showed up, as promised, with dessert: after some weighing of her options, she’d gone with vegan chocolate ice cream. Alex invited her in, and Maggie took in the vibe of the place; very simple, very zen, for the most part. Airy, high ceilings, a sleeping loft, exposed brick, a large eat-in kitchen. And one wall with a shelving unit overrun with many, many little potted plants. She smiled. She saw what she was pretty sure was the aloe plant she’d given to Astra, parked next to a potted petunia with lurid purple flowers. She smelled the basil and oregano plants on the windowsill. Not much of a view, just the backside of other loft buildings, but so what. 

“Nice place,” she commented, entering and presenting Alex with the ice cream.

“Thanks,” Alex said, and looked skeptically at the container. “Vegan ice cream, huh?”

“It’s pretty good,” Maggie promised. “You’ll see.”

She then smelled the smells from the stove. Astra stood in front of it, handling two large skillets with ease. She came over and peered into them. “Ginger?” she guessed.

Astra nodded. “Yes. Chinese broccoli and mushrooms, baby corn, bamboo shoots, and bok choy, with ginger and brown sauce. I have used seitan for the protein. I hope that is acceptable. I have never cooked with it before, as we are fond of meat.” She smiled a little, and continued jostling the skillets for a moment before covering them.

So while Astra finished cooking, they talked about the rescue the night before. Maggie left out Lucy’s role, since she didn’t know what Kara had told them and she’d promised Lucy she’d keep her secret. She was pleased to share with Astra that the techniques she’d been taught in her class had helped her to keep the attacker off balance long enough for help to arrive. They spent a while on the subject of Kara’s declaring herself, and Maggie was pleased to hear that Astra was firm about giving Kara some proper fight training. “No punch and pray, right?” she joked.

Dinner was as good as anything Maggie might have made herself, and she was exceedingly complimentary. The Stones were on low, their scratchy rock and roll wailing in the background, much to Maggie’s delight. They talked about the various cultures that Astra was sampling, how Alex had encouraged her interest in Roman history and re-enactment, and what books she was reading. Maggie had a long, long list of old movies to recommend. They talked marksmanship, and how they liked the various weapons available for borrowing at the firing range where Astra worked. They discussed the various alien food shops and whether Sappho’s had the best scones in the gay district (Maggie thought it did, Alex preferred the small English shop, Tea and Sympathy, situated around the corner from Sappho’s). 

Maggie rather wished that she’d been able to bring booze, because it was so pleasant and easy as it was that she felt like a few drinks and they’d all loosen up enough that she might have a shot. But still, she was having a nice enough time that she was plenty happy with just this. She didn’t exactly come here expecting anything, after all. Just hoping.

But, Maggie had to admit, if she was looking at things objectively, she was on her game that night. She made them laugh, she managed to get a few smooth remarks in and was rewarded with a look from one or the other that didn’t exactly discourage her. And more than once, as one or the other of them got up to go to the stove or the refrigerator, one of them absently would brush a hand across her shoulder. It was getting hard to ignore.

After dinner, Maggie insisted on helping clean up. Astra leaned over her shoulder, needlessly close, Maggie thought, to show her where the dish soap and towels were kept. Alex was flicking through the Netflix options to see if any of Maggie’s recommendations were available for them to watch together. “They do have Casablanca,” Alex observed.

Maggie nodded her approval. “That’s kind of a must.”

Astra peered over Alex’s shoulder at her tablet. “But why is there no color?”

Alex smiled. “It’s a very old movie, baby. They hadn’t figured out how to do color movies yet.”

Astra made a little bemused sound. She turned to Maggie, who was wiping her wet hands on her jeans. “Alex said you brought dessert?”

She nodded. “In the freezer.”

Astra retrieved the container of ice cream from the freezer, and gave it the same skeptical look that Alex had. She set it down on the counter and produced three small bowls and spoons, and served up the contents of the tub into them. 

Alex picked up hers, and took a spoonful. After a moment of tasting it, she swallowed. “It’s not bad,” she said, with some surprise. “I mean, it’s not real ice cream, but it’s not bad.”

Astra sampled hers. “You are right, Alex. It is not the same, but … I do not hate it.”

Maggie hesitated for a moment, watching them slowly eat another spoonful, watching their lips close around the spoons, watching them lick the remnants off when they were done. And the voice in her head, the one that she usually ignored in situations like this, had a few things to say. One of those things was, fuck it.

“You know what makes it taste better?”

They both looked at her.

And the spirit of mischief overcame Maggie, and her better angel completely departed her shoulder, and she took a modest half-spoonful of ice cream, and looked at Alex. “If you eat it off of your girlfriend.”

And she flicked that modest half-spoonful of chocolate vegan ice cream directly at Astra’s chest, which was exposed in the low tank-top she was wearing. She snickered at the startled, confused look that Astra wore at this, because she saw that Alex understood exactly what she had in mind.

“Hurry up,” Maggie urged, “before it melts and ends up in her bra!” 

So Alex, not being one to shrink from a challenge, leaned in quickly, and licked the melting ice cream off of Astra’s chest in one sweep. Astra gasped, and then laughed a little, and then just like that, all three of them were in on the moment.

“Here,” Maggie went on, looking at Astra, “you should try it.” And she flicked another modest amount of ice cream onto Alex. “Help her out.” Astra took her cue, and lunged in to help with her situation. 

“See?” Maggie was grinning now. “It tastes better, right?”

Alex nodded. “Yeah, definitely.”

“But the question remains, whose ice cream tastes better?” Astra pursued. She dipped a finger into her ice cream, pushed aside the shoulder strap of her tank top, and traced a little ice cream onto where the strap had been. “Is it the ice cream that she gets to eat from me, or the ice cream that I get to eat from her?”

 

*******************

That’s my baby, Alex thought. She watched, a little anxious, a little excited, a little scared, as Maggie licked the ice cream from Astra’s shoulder. Astra was biting her lip and gazing down at Maggie, and Alex took the ice cream and painted a little onto herself. “Now you have to try mine, and tell us which tastes better.” 

And then, she felt Maggie’s cool mouth, and Maggie’s tongue against her collarbone, licking the ice cream away, and she immediately wanted to know what that cool mouth and rough tongue felt like in other places. It tickled, it thrilled her, it turned her on. And she was laughing.

“I can’t possibly decide,” Maggie said, after having licked them both clean. “You’re both delicious.”

Alex and Astra were both laughing.

Maggie looked at her, and then at Astra. “You guys okay?” she asked.

Astra nodded.

It was a kind, thoughtful question. “Yeah, I’m fine.” Alex tilted her head. “I’m a little sticky, though.”

Maggie nodded. “Yeah, that is a side effect. Is it bothering you?”

“Hm,” Alex thought for a moment. “Not too much. Not yet.”

“I still have an unanswered question,” Astra interjected.

Alex looked at her. “What’s that, baby?”

Astra stepped nearer to Maggie, looking at her with the thoughtful expression that Alex had seen on her many times when she was about to try something new, the look that said she was observing and remembering as she did it. She carefully unbuttoned just the top button of Maggie’s button-down shirt, gently drawing it open a little. Then she dipped her finger into her dish of ice cream, and dropped an unceremonious blob of it onto Maggie’s chest. 

Maggie yelped at the cold, and Astra laughed, and Alex laughed too. “I need to know whether it tastes as good on Maggie as it does on you.” And she bent down a little, picked Maggie up, and parked her on the countertop. “It is easier if I do not have to bend down so much. You are a little small.” And she tilted her head down, and licked the ice cream off Maggie’s chest. “Delicious,” she announced after she had sampled.

Alex took her turn. Maggie was, she discovered, as tasty as she looked. 

Well, it all got easier --and stickier-- after that. It didn’t take long for their tops to come off (“OH DEAR, I AM SO SORRY TO HAVE DUMPED THIS VEGAN ICE CREAM ON YOUR SHIRT!”), and then for Alex to complain that she wasn’t down for being this sticky anymore, then for Maggie to pull the sprayer from the kitchen sink and spray them both with it, and for Alex to then escalate to a full-blown water fight, and for the three of them to eventually end up in the loft bed, damp, naked and grinning. Maggie was careful not to push too much, checking in with them often, lingering in the role of helper until she was asked to be otherwise. But she was asked, and frequently, because she had ways in bed that were different from theirs, and they loved the variation and novelty. And most of all, she made them laugh. God, she was so funny and playful, and she made them laugh.

Alex had never had sex that was this lighthearted, this messy and noisy and … and fun. It had never been like this between her and Astra. It was always intense. And that was beautiful, it was an expression of their souls. But God, there was something magical about seeing Astra smile in bed. Astra’s smile was so beautiful, and that rarer gift of laughter even more beautiful, and to share that while they were making love was a gift that she truly had not expected.

And they had Maggie to thank. 

 

*****************************

They lay together in the bed. The city was quiet, save an occasional car that rumbled past in the street below. Maggie was asleep in between them.

Astra pushed up onto one elbow and looked at Alex, who seemed to be dozing. “Alex,” she whispered.

Alex turned her head and looked at her, sleepy but happy. “Yeah, babe?”

“I would like to do this again.”

“Okay, babe.”

“It was good.”

“Yeah, babe.”

She looked at Maggie, so small, so pretty, so peaceful. “Also, I would like to kiss her.” 

Alex shifted onto her side and looked at Maggie. She nodded after a moment. “Me too, actually.”

They both leaned in, and kissed Maggie on either cheek. Maggie stirred, and seemed to take a moment to realize where she was. “Oh, hi,” she said, sounding slightly disbelieving.

Astra leaned down and kissed her mouth once. It was soft. The smile it brought to her lips was enchanting and warm. Alex took Maggie’s chin, tilted her face the other way, and kissed her too. 

Maggie spent a moment considering them and what that gesture of affection meant. “I hope you both know, I’m not ever going to try and come between you. I don’t know all the details, but I know you’ve been through a lot, and I would never try to take either one of you away from the other.”

Alex smiled. “I know.”

“And as you also know… I’m fresh off a divorce,” Maggie went on. “I’m not looking for anything serious. I just think you’re both amazing, and sexy, and fun to be with, and I think we can make each other happy for a while, you know?”

Astra nodded. “I think we would like that.”

“I won’t promise you the moon,” Maggie said, kissing each of them once more. “But if we get there?” She shrugged, smiling wryly. “Cool.”

Astra smiled. What a practical girl, she thought. She liked that. “You are staying the night, yes?”

“If you want.”

Alex settled back down into the pillows. “We do.”

And sleep settled back over the three of them.


	23. Blessings

Lucy leaned back against the wall of the elevator, the duffel bag with her suit hanging heavy in her hand. 

What a night.

Maggie had promised to call her if and when Corben woke up. Lucy had explained to Maggie what the stone was that had been powering Corben’s enhancements: weapons-grade Kryptonite, the kind that could hurt Superman, the kind that used to torture Astra In-Ze. She’d dropped off the chunk that she’d removed from Corben in the containment facility at the DEO. And now, she was turning things over in her head.

Kara was clearly Kryptonian. Lucy had thought so all along because the powers were identical to Superman. And her reaction to the Kryptonite she’d pulled out of Corben was further confirmation. 

But this was no small thing. Lucy had been convinced already that the Angel had been sent by the Aten, but now, knowing for certain that the Burning Angel was Kara, and knowing that her powers came from the sun, she began to review every interaction that she’d had with Kara, and it seemed ever more true as she reviewed them. 

There was no way that the figure she saw in flight that morning was anyone other than Kara. Kara was the reason she came downtown that morning. The reason she saw Maggie Sawyer and the reason she thought to visit Alex Danvers. Kara had affected her from the moment Lucy laid eyes on her and she hadn’t even realized it.

It was Kara who made her rethink the entire matter of being closeted in terms of justice. Kara who reminded her that she she needed to be in touch with the people she was defending. And it was Kara who sent her home with a small jade plant and some good advice after she’d gotten too emotional for her own good.

And it was Kara being in danger that called her forth as this shadow soldier, this fierce and mighty warrior. 

There was no way that Kara being brought into her sphere was anything but the will of the Aten. 

The elevator stopped and the penthouse door opened. She heard her wife’s laughter coming from the kitchen. “Baby?” she called. “I’m home!”

She trudged through the foyer into the kitchen, and stopped dead as she found Lena and Kara Danvers, sitting together at the counter, drinking milkshakes and laughing so hard they had tears coming down their faces.

She shook her head as if to clear it. “Kara?”

Kara turned around and looked at her, still grinning so hard she looked like her face was going to break. “Lucy? What are you doing here?”

“I live here,” Lucy replied with a frown, dropping her duffle bag and walking into the room. “What are you doing here?”

Lena was grinning. “Oh, you two know each other?”

Kara shook her head, residual laughter still lighting her face. “You might say.”

Lucy kept glancing between her wife and her new friend. “But how do you know each other?”

Lena smiled. “She interviewed me for the Trib’s science column a few weeks ago.”

Lucy nodded slowly. “You’re our dinner guest next week,” she realized, and she started to laugh, too. She came over, and embraced Lena, and kissed her, a little too hard on the mouth, because she needed the comfort of her wife’s kiss after what had been a long, intense day and a harrowing night. She drew away after kissing Lena for little longer than was polite, but Kara didn’t seem uncomfortable. To the contrary, she seemed to enjoy their display of affection.

“That’s beautiful,” Kara murmured to no-one in particular. “That’s the kind of love I want one day. Of course you two are together. Of course.” She shook her head, looked at Lena and laughed again. “You’re the missus!” she realized. 

Lena nodded. “I’m the missus. And you’re the mysterious friend who sent my wife home with a potted plant instead of flowers after she acted like a jackass this afternoon.” God, that felt like a month ago, now. She reached over and squeezed Kara’s hand. “Which was a very good move, by the way.”

******************

Kara looked at Lucy. “You’re the wife I kept hearing about that I was gonna love so much.”

Lucy put her hands on her hips. “Well, do you?”

Kara gave her a coy smile. “Well, I’d say I’m fond, at the least.”

They laughed, and then retired to the living room, where Kara sat between them, and they talked and talked until the the small, pale hours of morning. They talked about Lucy’s life as an army brat and her struggles with her difficult father, and how she could never understand why he had so much hate in him for people who were different, when he’d married a woman who was of a faith that was rare in most of the rest of the country. She talked about how her year when he was stationed in Akhetaten was so very magical. They had more milkshakes and Lena talked about being adopted by Lionel Luthor and how she didn’t understand how the brother who had once been kind and charming and kept her secrets became a genocidal maniac. Kara went so far as to confess Astra’s connection to Myriad, and Lena was a deep well of empathy at how much it had saddened Kara to learn that one of her only living relatives had come just short of doing something so terrible, no matter how pure the intentions.

To lighten the mood, they told some variations of “a nun, a rabbi and an Atenist priest walk into a bar” jokes.

But Lucy turned serious, then, at around 5 a.m.. She took Kara’s other hand, the one that Lena wasn’t currently squeezing, and looked at her thoughtfully for a long moment. “I didn’t get a chance to say everything I meant to down at the scene tonight. But it’s so clear to me now, that the Aten has sent us a mighty gift, and that gift is you, Kara.”

Kara blushed a little, but didn’t let go of their hands. “I… Lucy….”

“You saved my wife. You saved irreplaceable sacred texts. You saved my marriage. And you make Lena laugh. It takes a lot to make her laugh the way she was when I walked in here. Our faith doesn’t have angels the way the Christians think of them, but you’re a manifestation of the divine, Kara. ” Impulsively, she closed her other hand around Kara’s and brought it once to her lips, and began to pray:

“You are in my heart,  
There is no other who knows you,  
Only your son, Neferkheprure, Sole-one-of-Re,  
Whom you have taught your ways and your might…”

Confusion crossed Kara’s face for a moment, until Lena joined her, and their voices blended into one, reverberating softly in the immaculate space, and then Kara understood. They were thanking their god for her, a feeling that both thrilled and intimidated her. Lena closed her hands around Kara’s other hand, as Lucy had done, and brought it to her lips as well, and the prayer continued.

“...Those on earth come from your hand as you made them,  
When you have dawned they live,  
When you set they die;  
You yourself are lifetime, one lives by you.  
All eyes are on your beauty until you set…”

“I don’t think she’s wrong,” Lena whispered to Kara as Lucy continued praying. “I believe you are a gift from the Aten, whose light gives you these extraordinary gifts.” 

She bowed her head again, and continued to murmur the prayer, which was familiar to them both. Kara felt hot and flushed under this attention. And then her heartbeat spiked as Lena turned her hand over and exposed the inside of her wrist.

“The hydrogen atom,” she murmured. “One of the building blocks of life.” And she pressed her lips to it.

Kara’s pulse surged. 

Lucy paused in her prayers, and looked at the inside of Kara’s other wrist. “Beauty too rich for use,” she read, “for Earth too dear.” She nodded approvingly, and laid her lips to the words.

Kara shivered involuntarily, and gasped a little, then flushed. “I’m… I’m sorry…” She felt guilty. This was clearly some sort of religious thing for them and here she was, finding herself desiring them both, and responding sexually to their expressions of faith.

“For what?” Lucy murmured.

“Um…”

One of Lena’s fingers trailed over a complex string of equations that wrapped around the middle of her bicep. “What’s this?”

“It’s… the formula for… for time crystals.”

“Those are just theoretical,” Lena whispered, staring at the math that curled around her arm.

“They weren’t on Krypton. We used them as hyperconductors.” 

Lena sighed, and pressed her lips to the equations where they adorned Kara. Kara couldn’t help it; she drew another sharp little breath. “You’re a true light,” she murmured, and Kara felt herself melt just a little more.

She looked between the two of them, who were both focused on her, and her alone. The two of them exchanged a brief look, a quiet nod, and returned to slowly exploring the markings on her skin, first with their eyes, then fingertips, then lips, adding some small comment at each one: how beautiful, how blessed, the Aten’s light has touched you, we must be blessed that you were sent to us with this emblazoned on your skin.

Kara’s eyes dropped closed then, as they sat together in the quiet, Lucy and Lena inspecting and praising every visible inch of the skin on her arms. They had to know, she thought, they had to know what this felt like for her. They had to want that. They had passed the crossroads of ambiguity some miles back at this point.

She opened her eyes and looked first at Lena, and then at Lucy, who were both still gazing at her intently. Kara had felt something for both of them since she’d met them. Maybe this was the kind of fate that the truly faithful talked about. The work of Rao, of the Aten, of Christ, of Vishnu or Yahweh, who knew? She went for broke. Looking at Lucy’s eyes, how they burned with peculiar intensity at this moment, she asked softly, “Would you like to see the rest of them?”

They both nodded.

“But why don’t we move this to the roof deck?” Lena suggested. “The sun’s going to be rising very soon. I think it would be good to have our angel with us for sunrise prayer, don’t you think?”

Kara’s body was a taut string on an instrument, waiting to be plucked, waiting for all her tones to be sounded. She would have followed them anywhere and done just about anything they asked at this point. So they ascended in the elevator, and walked to the glass altar at the far side of the deck.

The sun’s rays were just beginning to warm the sky, and the light was collecting and pooling in the curves and swells of the beautiful altar. It almost seemed to glow with a transcendent light. Kara watched as Lucy and Lena both stripped from their clothes in the cool morning air. She had heard that many Atenists prayed naked when in their own homes, particularly for the sunrise prayer. But then they turned to Kara, and with hands as reverent as any that had ever touched her, they undressed her, and spent a moment gazing at her, taking her in. And then, in the morning’s cool, she knelt in between them as they bent their knees before the altar and sang the sunrise hymn.

“Splendid you rise in heaven's lightland,  
O living Aten, creator of life!  
When you have dawned in eastern lightland,  
You fill every land with your beauty.  
You are beauteous, great, radiant,  
High over every land;  
Your rays embrace the lands,  
To the limit of all that you made.  
Being Re, you reach their limits,  
You bend them for the son whom you love;  
Though you are far, your rays are on earth,  
Though one sees you, your strides are unseen.”

There was a hymn, she thought vaguely, that she had learned as a child, a hymn to Rao that she had mostly forgotten, but she thought that it was very like this one. She didn’t know whether it was her desire to be touched by them again, or that there was a likeness between their faiths after all, but she felt an element of fate to be found in their coming together. If she was deluded, she decided, she didn’t care.

They stood, and she stood with them. They took her between them, before the altar, and Lena murmured a brief prayer that the Aten should bless their encounter with his angel, and smile upon them, and bring her the joy of its light. 

And there they laid her on the altar, and with more of this careful reverence, they gave thanks and praise to every inch of her skin, kissed and touched the markings on her, of art, of mathematics, poetry and science, astronomy, humanity, beauty. They made love to her there, divine love, sacred love. 

Kara had never had her senses so filled before. She had never had the sensation of being whispered to by two voices, and stroked by two soft pairs of hands. She had never had both her mouth and her sex kissed passionately at the same time, never had fingers raking through her hair while two more hands trailed down her hips and inner thighs, and never, never had she had all this under the warm light of the yellow sun, and the soft caresses of the breezes. 

They took turns in satisfying her, until she lost count, and lay breathless on the altar between them.

“I…” she began, but she could hardly finish. She smiled at both of them. “So, do you guys do this a lot?”

They both laughed. “No,” Lena promised her. “You would be the first we’ve ever shared this way. But you’re also the first to come into our lives straight from the hand of the Aten.”

Kara nodded, not knowing what to say. “Okay. So … this …” She gestured at their entire situation. “... isn’t like, sacrilege or something?”

Lucy laughed. “No, not at all. We’re sanctified by making love in the Aten’s light.”

Kara’s head was spinning. “Okay.” She looked at them. How could they both be this beautiful? How could she have been given such a thing? “So, we’re not like, married now or anything, right?”

Lucy and Lena both laughed. “No,” Lucy promised. “But the sharing of our bodies is blessed.”

Kara grinned stupidly. She pointed at the pavilion on the other side of the deck. “What’s in there?”

“A bed,” Lucy answered, brushing some hair from Kara’s eyes.

Kara sat up, suddenly energetic. “Can we go lay in it?”

The two of them looked utterly charmed by her. They each took one of her hands and walked to the pavilion, and the three of them climbed into bed. “Now,” Kara said, feeling very eager, “can I watch you two make love to each other? So I can learn what you like?”

And they both kissed her, and then they both kissed one another, and then they did as their angel asked.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We've come to the end of the arc folks. Thank you all so much for coming with us on this journey into the multiverse, for all your comments, and all your love. It's been a pleasure creating the world and a privileged to work on it with my friends. 
> 
> For the chapters events laid out in verse check out [Autumn Dawning](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11145171).

**Author's Note:**

> I have created a collection which, as it grows, will host poetry written to apply to this universe, as well as some historical background articles, written by my two partners in crime, thebraveandthebroiled and alittlebitsuper, respectively. Please stop by and check it out as this fic continues. You can find the collection here:  
>    
> [Aten's Blessings Collection](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/atenist_superfic)


End file.
